Resonance
by Batwynn
Summary: Tony Stark has been blinded thanks to an accident he can fully blame on SHIELD, and well, that's pretty much the end of his life. Or, so he thinks, until a mysterious British man starts visiting him in his hospital room. He doesn't tell him who he is, but he likes to read to Tony, and there's blueberries, and conversation, and goodbye kisses.
1. Meant to be Seen, Not Heard

"Hello."

Tony turned towards the voice, a scowl already in place for the stranger who dared to enter his room. Company was not very welcome, not even Rodney, or Steve, and especially not Pepper. But he knew all of their voices by now, and this was not one of the familiar ones.

"I told them I didn't want an assistant, so you can fuck right off from—"

"I am not your 'assistant'."

His scowl eased into a confused frown, and he continued to stare pointlessly at what he assumed, by the deeper voice, was a guy.

"Who are you, then?" He asked slowly, keeping his body turned towards him and making sure to remember to blink even behind his dark sunglasses. He had managed to fool people before, he could do it again.

"Do you not recognize me? I rather thought I struck a stronger cord than that."

Tony turned away again and started picking at the edge of his blanket.

So he did know him, then. That wasn't good, it was harder to pretend he was okay with someone he's met before. But, who did he know that spoke in that drawling British accent and supposedly left an impression on him? Someone from the company... no, no one had visited from Stark Industries yet. Not that he expected any of his staff or board members to come see him, they weren't exactly close.

Maybe a fellow scientist or engineer? That was even more unlikely, considering that most others in the field hated his guts. Unless... unless this was one of his competitors, here with the intent to kill him or rub his failure in his face. He hoped it was the former.

"I don't remember you, and you can leave now."

There was a delicate snort, and Tony felt the bed by his legs dip under the stranger's weight.

"I find that hard to believe, Stark," the man said, "I rather thought you would give me a much more explosive greeting. I must admit, I am rather disappointed in your lackluster performance."

"Oh, i'm _sorry_, I wasn't aware of your royal status," Tony snapped, turning back to him and furrowing his brows. Shit, he hoped he was at least facing the right direction. "Should I clap? Am I supposed to kneel and kiss your feet?"

There was a short, tense silence, but Tony could hear the smirk in the man's voice when he spoke again, "kneeling yes, feet kissing, no."

"I'm not kneeling to you, you freak."

"Ah, I had forgotten your disinterest in adapting any form of manners."

"Unless you're the fucking Queen of England, which I highly doubt, unless she's gone through a sex change and lost a few years, i'm _not_ kneeling to you."

"Would you have a drink with me, then?" The voice asked, and Tony forgot to blink.

_That_, was familiar. Those words, that tone, the same inflections even. Why the hell was that familiar?

"I'm in a hospital," he replied at last, well aware of how bitter his voice sounded. "I don't think the nurses here are the type to wear skimpy dresses and serve booze."

Tony waited, and waited, and waited for a response. At one point, he was convinced the man had somehow snuck out of the room again without him hearing it. So when the voice spoke up again, he jerked in surprise at the sudden sound.

"Stark... why are you here?"

"Bladder infection," he lied.

"Stark."

"Yep, not enough cranberries, apparently. I mean, I eat blueberries by the truck load, but that's—"

"Why won't you look at me?" The stranger interrupted, causing Tony to choke on his words.

He hadn't been facing the right direction after all, what an idiot! He knew his ears weren't good enough for this, too many explosions and too much loud music. At least, according to Pepper.

Who was this, anyway? Who the hell supposedly knew him, but didn't have even an inkling of what happened? Anyone of the Avengers, members of SHEILD, hell, even some of the local police force knew what happened.

Well, he sure as hell wasn't going to tell him, the British bastard could be one of press for all he knew.

"I don't want to see your face," he quipped lamely, "is that a problem?"

"No, that is not it," the voice said, sounding much closer suddenly," you look but you do not _see_."

Tony's shoulders hunched inwards as he tried to pull away, but there was no where to escape to but back into his mountain of pillows. He was trapped, and he didn't liked that feeling very much.

"Stark..."

"_Don't_," he begged, squeezing his eyes shut. Fingers ghosted over his face, and the glasses were pulled away. Swift but gentle fingers brushed over his scarred eyelids.

"Have you been blinded?"

Tony's breath hitched in his throat, his heart rate rising rapidly. He could hear the heart monitor scream at him, blaring into the silence as his answer. The stranger brushed his fingers across his skin, once, twice more, and a small, almost mournful sound filled the room.

Then, they were pulling away, and Tony almost leaned after them, craving the touch that had become soothing. There was a breath of air against his forehead, and the bed shifted gently.

Tony's voice cracked as whispered, "who _are_ you?" to an empty room.

"Hey!"

"Fuck off, Clint."

"Aww, Tony, nooo..." Clint whined, coming closer anyway. Tony was suddenly assaulted by weird petting motions across his head and face.

"Would you cut that—" he swatted at him, "—_out_! What do you want, anyway? The so-called grapes your brought last time were actually dates. Who the hell gets that wrong? Even I could tell, and i'm blind."

"They taste the same."

Tony snorted and leaned back into his pillows, not bothering to keep up the pretense of normality. Clint was okay. In fact, he was the only one who didn't make him feel like a freak, or weak, or make him feel even remotely bad about being blinded. He didn't whisper around him, he didn't tip-toe around certain words, and he sure as hell didn't stop being his usual idiot self.

"Why are you blessing me with your idiotic presence, again?" Tony asked with a knowing smirk.

"I bring presents and a message from Fury," Clint replied, dropping something heavy on Tony's legs. He yelped, both in pain and surprise at his words.

A message from Fury was not a good sign. The man hadn't said anything since the accident, but it was pretty obvious what the situation was.

"I'm out, huh?"

Clint's silence was more than enough of an answer, and Tony turned away from the archer for the first time ever during one of his visits. He wasn't going to cry, hell, he didn't know if he even _could_ cry anymore. He just needed to look away, he needed to hide his face like a child. Because maybe if he hid behind his hands, the world would disappear.

"That's all from me in there," Clint said, sounding further away. Tony heard the door click open, and the sudden rush of hospital sounds filled the room. "There aren't any dates, by the way."

"If there are," Tony muttered, "i'm shoving them up your ass next time."

Clint just laughed, and Tony smiled until the door shut with a snap.

He found out later, when he finally managed to bring himself to open the package, that there _were_ dates after all. Luckily, for Clint, there was a wide assortment of other fruit as well. The archer even remembered his favorite chocolate covered blueberries, although, he had a sneaking suspicion Bruce had a hand in that.

Bruce. God, he missed Bruce the most. He visited for the first week after they tried to save his eyes, every day even. But after that, he stared coming less and less, and each visit had this weird tension. It wasn't until the last time he saw him that the scientist explained himself.

"I can't do this anymore, Tony."

Tony had been smiling, apparently oblivious to Bruce's real mood as they played twenty questions. His smile slipped at the distraught tone of his friend's voice.

"What do you mean, big guy? Just because i'm on a winning streak, doesn't mean you have to quit."

Bruce cleared his throat, and Tony heard him shift nervously in his chair.

"Can't do _what_ anymore, Bruce?"

There was a sigh before he spoke,

"I can't visit you like this anymore. Every time I see you it's like a knife to my chest. I've already had three panic attacks on my way through the hospital." He paused, his voice lowering, "you know how dangerous that is."

"I'm ... i'm upsetting you that much?"

"Not upsetting, no it's not... i'm not explaining myself well."

A prick of anger made Tony's throat close up, and he balled his fists into the thing hospital sheets. "Then leave! Just... _leave_," he hissed, turning away from the man sharply. This wasn't happening, not now, not with Bruce. Bruce was his only escape from this place, his own little oasis.

Bruce started to backtrack, babbling out a slew of excuses, stated like facts. He kept going until Tony threw his lunch tray in his general direction and screamed in wordless rage at him.

He nearly missed it, over his own angry panting, the small "_I'm sorry_," that would be the last thing he heard from Bruce in weeks.

He missed him, hell, he wasn't even angry anymore. That had been unfair, screaming at him like that. Bruce was sensitive, not just because of the other guy, but just a fragile soul. Too many betrayals, too much hurt and loss in his past. For Tony to make him feel guilty for feeling hurt, that was just _wrong_. But he never got a chance to apologize, and he had too much pride to try to pass a message through anyone else for him. Clint had asked right out if they had a fight, and what did Tony do, and if he was going to apologize. He just snapped something nasty at the time, and Clint shrugged it off. It wasn't like Clint's life had been any easier, but some people are built differently than others. Insults rolled off the man like water off of Fury's bald head.

_Oh, right. Fury._

Tony scowled and shoved a handful of the blueberries into his mouth, chewing angrily. The man hadn't bothered to come himself, the fucking coward. This was his fault, Tony had decided, so he should come to personally grovel at his feet. If SHIELD hadn't asked for more weapons, and if Fury hadn't threatened him to make them, he wouldn't be here, sitting alone eating fruit he had to name by feeling their fucking shape.

He grabbed another handful and popped some into his mouth, not caring that his lips were probably turning blue from the juice. He knew he looked like shit, anyway. Not much he can do when he can't see himself to shave.

"You seem spirited."

Tony choked and ended up tipping the entire basket of blueberries into his lap. After recovering some of his shattered dignity, he said, "Welcome back, mystery Brit."

"Not sending me away like before?"

Tony pondered this a moment and shrugs nonchalantly. "If you help pick up my blueberries, you can stay."

"Blueberries?"

"Uh, yeah. Those berries all over my lap... that are _blue_?"

There was a huff and Tony felt the man tilt the basket upright. "How uncreative a name."

"What, you guys don't have blueberries in England?"

"Perhaps not," the voice came from next to him.

Tony snorted in disbelief, and tried to scoop the berries out of his lap, not exactly willing to allow a stranger to dig around that close to his privates. When he couldn't find anymore, he leaned back and listened to the creak of the man's clothing. Leather, rather heavy clothing for a New York summer. Was he part of a biker gang? Did the Brits have bike gangs, and what would they even be called, the Dappers?

"Who are you?"

There was a brush of cold fingers against his lips, and a berry was popped into his mouth.

"What happened to you?" the man asked.

"What, can't wait to read it in the papers like everyone else?" Tony grumbled, pushing the blueberry around his mouth and popping it with his teeth.

There was another huff of laughter, and another berry was pushed past his lips.

"You think so highly of yourself, this injury matters so highly to the public?"

Clearly someone didn't know him as well as he thought he did. Tony sneered and crossed his arms, turning his face away. "I can see the headlines now, '_Billionaire and Inventor, Tony Stark, Blinded by Science_'."

The man jabbed him in the cheek, startling him and shoving another berry in his open mouth.

This was by far the oddest thing he'd ever done with a stranger, and he has done some bizarre things. Being fed by a random British guy, someone he supposedly knew at some point, who didn't seem to know that much about him, but was more than willing to sit there and _feed_ him.

For the first time in a very long while, he was struck speechless. So, he just sat there and let those oddly chilled fingers push berries into his mouth one by one until they were gone. When he finally stopped, Tony let out a surprised grunt and reached out automatically before snatching his hand back.

"Uh, thanks, I guess. Do you do that for all the people you leave an 'impression' on?"

"No," he answered and stood up from the bed. "I must go."

"I'd show you the door, but you know..."

He was answered by another soft breath against his forehead, and it was hours later when he realized it was a goodbye kiss.

Tony found himself waiting for his biker gang Brit between his other visits. It wasn't that he didn't appreciate Clint's dry humor and his god damn dates, or Natasha's silent visits where they played chess. He somehow beat her six out of the ten times they played, pretty good for a blind man. He still missed Bruce and their science chats, and he pointedly ignored Steve when he came to visit. That was a bridge that needed mending, but not any time soon. Not when the man hassled him along with Fury for those weapons.

No, it wasn't like he was lonely, but, he was _lonely_.

He liked his mystery guest, who had now taken it upon himself to feed Tony almost every visit, and Tony had made it a habit to save his fruits until he showed up. The visitor also started reading to him, old favorites that Tony had no idea how the man knew he liked them. They had been working their way through Lord of the Rings when the man suddenly stopped coming.

Tony didn't worry for the first day, but he saved a box of strawberries all the same. He didn't eat anything from the disgusting hospital 'food', because it was gross, not because he was waiting. He stole a strawberry in the late afternoon of the next day, and maybe he was starting to worry. Three days later, he was standing by the window, face pointed out blindly. Clint had asked him twice already why he pretended to look out before Tony told him it was just to feel the sun. The bastard then called him an old man, and tony managed to clip him with the chess board, earning him a much appealing squawk.

But he _was_ worried, really worried. He never got the sense that his mystery guest was in any trouble. He always seemed calm, collected, almost happy even. It was strange how much Tony could feel from him, almost as if losing his sight gave him a Spidey Sense or something. It was pretty useful, when someone was actually here. But the one person he wanted to visit most, was gone. Maybe he had said something that pissed him off, not that they talked that much. In fact, Tony hadn't said much other than, "Who are you?" and "You sound like a creaky bed, who wears leather in the summer?"

The man didn't seem pissed the last time he came, he even gave Tony the usual brush of a kiss across his forehead. It's not like he ever promised he would come back, he never promised anything. But Tony had a bad feeling about it. His Spidey Sense was tingling.

"No! You can't just—"

"Sir!"

"AWAY FROM ME, I AM VISITING A DEAR FRIEND!"

Tony's fingers froze over a strawberry, a wide grin breaking out across his face. Only one person had a voice like that, and talked like he swallowed a Shakespearean play. The door blew open and Tony turned to greet him automatically.

"Hey, Point Break!"

"Man of Iron!" Thor shouted amid the shushing and hissing from the nurses. "Upon my arrival to Midgard, I was told you had been wounded in battle, yet I see no wound. Are you well?"

Tony's smile faltered, only a little, and he flipped his dark glasses up, staring at Thor with scarred, ruined eyes. There was a hiss of surprise, and the door snapped closed as the nurses left begrudgingly.

Tony cleared his throat and tired to lighten the mood, "I know you love me, buddy, but you didn't have to come back from Asgard so early just for me."

There was the unmistakable sound of Thor's heavy bulk sitting in the weak, plastic chair by the bed before he spoke, "My apologies, but I had not returned with the knowledge that you were wounded. I have come back for an unfortunate reason."

"And that is? Don't tell me there's another global threat by flying horse women, again. That was not even funny. Why did you think that was funny?"

"Did you not enjoy the prank, friend?" Thor asked with a deep chuckle. His voice lowered into a serious tone as he continued, "No, I fear this is a very real crisis. My brother... Loki, has escaped from Asgard. We can only assume he returned here, since Heimdall only saw his departure from Asgard and nothing more."

"Loki's here? On Earth? Since when?"

"He escaped his prison several months ago, but has been missing ever since. I would like to think him alive and well, not stirring up trouble... and yet, I cannot help but wonder if he has..."

Tony picked at the leaves at the top of his strawberry, a weird through passing through his mind. Loki, dead? No, his brain was absolutely sure he was not. Why he was so sure, he had no idea.

"Thor, buddy, I don't think a stubborn bastard like him would up and die like that. I mean, come on, that little shit was surrounded by us and he still has the audacity to ask for a dr... a drink."

"_Would you have a drink with me, then?_"

No, that wasn't what he had said, was it? Tony's brows drew together as he tried to remember. It had been almost a year ago, already, yet he could still see that look in Loki's eyes when he was carted back to Asgard.

"_I'll have that drink now._"

Wait, that was...

"Oh my fucking _god_!" Tony yelped, his hand slapping over his mouth. It wasn't until Thor's massive hands were shaking him, his voice rumbling in his ears that he came back to reality.

"Man of—"

"You said he was here?" Tony interrupted, panic starting to well up in his stomach. It couldn't be, why _would_ it be? Why the hell would Loki come and visit him, never mind read to him, _feed_ him!?

"I believe he is. I sense his magic's presence somewhere within this realm."

"T-then, you know where he is right now?"

Thor shifted in his chair, and the poor abused thing let out a warning groan. "No, I can only sense that he has lingered in this city for some time. Nearby, even. That is why I came here first, I was concerned he had been stalking you in your weakened state." Thor paused for a moment, his voice sounding almost guilty when he continued, "You may be in danger, Man of Iron."

Tony was pulling off all the leaves of his strawberries before he forced himself to stop and put the box of fruit down. It was Loki, it had to be. Now the question was, did he tell Thor? That would mean people sticking around his room, waiting for his mystery—well, not so mysterious anymore—guest. That would mean Thor capturing him and taking him back to Asgard without Tony ever getting his answer as to why the god was visiting him in the first place. That would mean no more readings, no more fruit stealing or snappy conversations. No more soft breathing, cold fingers, and delicate kisses for his forehead.

"Well," he began slowly, "I'm sure there's a mistake. Why would he come here? I'm not even the one who threw him around like a rag-doll. If there's anyone you want to keep an eye on, it's Bruce."

"The scientist and his other half?"

"Yeah, that one. He's back at the tower right now, have you checked there? Seems like a likely target for your pissed off brother."

Thor's chair screamed as he stood, and heavy hands laid themselves on Tony's shoulders once more. "I am sorry you were hurt, my friend, and please alert me immediately if you see... if you have any clues that he has been around."

"Of course," Tony lied, "I'll see what I can do."


	2. Signs Point to Yes

R 2

Signs Point to Yes

Loki. His biker gang, Lord of the Rings reading, fruit feeding, kiss giving almost friend was _Loki_.

The same guy who threw him out a window, and oh yeah, almost killed Phil.

Tony scowled more at the thought of Phil than the window incident. Another lie from SHIELD, and a good one. What a better way to get your heroes to behave than to break them from the inside.

Still, an alive Phil was better than a dead Phil. He just didn't appreciate finding out after he was fucking blinded and couldn't see the man again, even if he wanted too. Anyway, this was supposed to be about Loki.

The thing was, Tony was good at reading people. Well, okay, not everyone. Pepper was a mystery he would never solve, and no longer had the option to try. But he could humbly admit that he knew precisely what buttons to push to get a person to reveal themselves for who they really were. His ability had been damped down considerably since the accident, but it didn't take a blind man to see that Loki was crazy. Or, _was_ crazy.

Tony tried to remember what Thor had said about his brother's punishments when the blond returned to Earth previously. He had looked depressed, not the same 'kicked puppy' look when he usually talked about Loki, but down right hollowed out and empty. They weren't going to ask him at first, but after a week of nonstop rain and lightning storms, Natasha went after him for answers. Tony had a feeling she was just sick of the humidity ruining her hair.

His answer was not what any of them expected. Tony had visions of an execution as the most drastic option, and a padded cell as the most lenient. What they did instead, was ten times worse. At first, they silenced him, Thor had said, with sewn lips. Tony figured it was a metaphor until Thor told them he had been forced to sew them himself.

Bruce left the room at that point, going green for more than one reason, and Tony really didn't want to stay to hear the rest of it, himself. But he did, because he had to know why.

_

"Magic," Thor answered, "his words give him magic."

"Uh, no offense, but we've all seen him use magic without yelling 'abracadabra!'"

Thor looked confused and ready to ask what sort of spell that was, when Natasha interject cooly, "You guys did more than just sew his mouth shut, didn't you?"

Thor nodded solemnly, and when turned his face down, his voice came out low and flat, "his hands were also... kept from producing his spells."

"Oh _Jesus_," Tony breathed, leaning back into the couch he had snagged when they first sat down. "Do I even want to know how? Let me guess, you broke them?"

Thor let out a pained groan and met his eyes. That was more than enough of an answer, but Thor explained anyway, "his hands were pressed between two metal plates, spelled to stay closed for an eternity, or until he was deemed worthy of their release. They were tightened till his bones broke, and he had not even an inch to move his fingers."

The silence after his words was filled with everyone's own mental images of it, until Tony spoke up again.

"Why?"

Thor furrowed his brow. "His magic is—"

"No, no. You're missing the big, shiny, lit up question here."

"Tony..." Natasha warned.

"Why, Thor? Why would you do that to your _brother_?"

Clint huffed from wherever he was hiding—probably under the couch— and Tony narrowed his eyes at them all, feeling oddly out of place by being the only one looking disappointed in this news.

"Look, I know he deserves punishment, i'm not saying otherwise. But could any of you guys do that, to your own family? I mean, Jesus... you _crushed_ his fucking hands!"

Thor stood abruptly, and Tony was reminded that, yes, this was a god i'm his living room, and boy did he look mad.

"You think I _desired_ this?!" his roared, and outside a new wave of rain began rolled down the windows. "I begged my father for a more lenient punishment, _begged_! But Loki had to fight, to dig the knife in further with every poisoned word he spoke. He drove the Allfather to such lengths with his treats and curses, he simply _could_ not accept any kindness we offered. I would not, I would never have..." He turned his head to the side, and the shadows did a good job at hiding what Tony knew was grief.

"No, Thor, I didn't mean..." Tony began, and stood up. He felt like an asshole, well, more of one than usual. "I didn't mean it like that."

"How did you mean it, then?"

"I just... how did you even _do_ it?"

Thor turned back again, his expression showing Tony exactly how he did it, and his time Thor didn't explain.

Now Tony had to wonder how a god, sewn and locked up with hands like cheese between slices of bread, was talking and feeding him berries. Maybe he was wrong, after all this, and it was a British gang leader with an affinity for good fiction and feeding strangers. Tony didn't know which option was worse, at this point. A real stranger, or Loki?

Again, the question always came back to 'why?'

_Why me, why Loki, why the visits, why the kisses?_

Tony's cheeks tinted pink at the realization that he had been enjoying those affectionate gestures each time they were given, and now that he knew it was Loki...

"I see Thor has come to see you."

Tony snapped his head up so sharply his neck creaked. "You've got to stop doing that, unless you're doing on purpose to spook the poor blind Iron Man as some sort of pretty revenge, then, by all means, do continue. I prefer this to being thrown out the window."

There was the usual amused huff from across the room, and Tony waited for the mattress to dip under his weight. When it didn't, he untucked himself from the sheets and slid off the edge of the bed.

"What are you doing?" the voice asked, unusually tense.

"What, afraid of a little old, blind man?" Tony quipped and lifted his hands out in front of him as he shuffled closer.

"You are but a child, compared to me," came his answer, and cold hands found Tony's in midair.

"Funny, coming from the guy who attacked an entire planet in some sort of temper tantrum."

Loki hissed, and the fingers intertwined between his dug into Tony's hands. "You did say you preferred the _window_, correct?"

Tony grunted in pain, but continued to press on. Okay, so maybe he was a little insane, or suicidal. That wasn't all that surprising, considering his life was over anyway.

"Don't waste your energy," Tony sighed, and felt Loki's breath brush again this forehead, "you could probably just break my neck right here."

"Stark, you are not supposed to invite me to kill you."

"Why not?" Tony asked, and realized it almost sounded like a plea.

There was a pause before one of Loki's hands broke from his grasp and touched his cheek gently. It was kind, and careful, and Tony realized that if he did want to die, it had to be by these hands.

"Stark... I will not kill you," Loki murmured softly. "That is not... that is not why I came."

"Then, _why_? Why are you here now? Why did you come here in the first place?"

"I do not know," came his answer in a sigh, and the hand against his cheek traced its way down to his jaw. Cold fingers started to play with his beard, which was already way too long for comfort in the summer heat.

"I do not _know_," Loki repeated, and Tony felt the same breathy kiss he always did. Only this time, it was against his lips.

His fingers squeezed at Loki's hand, because he always knew what came next. But it was too late, the god was pulling away, and with a soft crackle, he was gone.

_

He didn't wait around this time, partially because he knew what Loki had at stake if he came around too often, and also because he was a little terrified to see him again.

Well, feel him again.  
_  
__Shit._

So maybe he was waiting, because the only thing that came out of his last visit was more questions.

Why? Why the fuck did Loki kiss him? A kiss on the forehead was one thing, but lips? Well, it was more like a breath against his mouth, but he could almost still feel it.

Tony brushed a thumb over his lips. There was a definite chill there, all the way from three days ago. Tony wondered if there was some magic involved and if Loki actually did want to kill him, why take the long road?

"Tony? Are you not feeling well?"

He dropped his hand and tilted his head towards the doctor. They were on a first name basis by now, doctor Jim something. It didn't take long to get there, since all that really mattered was that Jim put up with his shit rather well, and Tony liked a challenge.

"I'm fine, Doc. You need to stop sneaking me pudding though, i'm losing my figure."

"Oh please, the only thing disfiguring about you right now is that thing growing on your chin," the doctor commented, and suddenly gloved hands were tiling his head up.

"That bad, huh?"

"You ever seen 'Cast Away'?"

"_Ouch_."

The hand let go and there was a rush of air as Jim moved away again. "You need a shave. Can you think of anyone you trust enough to hold a razor to your throat?"

"When you put it like that, no," Tony replied with a snort. Maybe he could ask Loki to do it. Oh, there was that suicidal part of his brain talking again.

"I can do it, if you want," Jim offered and Tony grimaced when their was a familiar tightness of a rubber band around his upper arm. He knew what was next, at this point. The first time they gave him a shot, no one bothered to warn him and just stabbed into his arm like he knew what was going on. Well, they've sure leaned their lesson since then.

"Sure," Tony said with a small shrug, "so far you're the only one with steady enough hands for shaping my beard back into its handsome shape."

Jim openly scoffed at 'handsome shape' and tapped the inside of his elbow with his fingers. Tony automatically flexed his fist and flinched a little when the cold damp from the alcohol touched his skin. He still wasn't used to things just happening to him, to not be able to see it coming or track it with his eyes.

"Alright, needle coming," his doctor warned, and Tony nodded. The prick against his skin wasn't terrible, Tony wasn't that much of a wimp. But it was much easier to keep himself from jumping when he had fair warning.

It took a while to draw his blood, and Tony guessed they were running some more tests on the chemicals that entered his blood system from the accident. So far there were no resounding side effects, but they wouldn't let him leave until they were sure. It drove him nuts, but since he wasn't exactly in any condition to check for himself, he let them do their damn jobs, for once.

"This is the last time we check, so you're going to have to keep us updated from home, from now on."

Tony perked up instantly, not even noticing when Jim pulled he needle out. "You're releasing me? I can go? When, today?"

"Easy there, not for another two days. You need to do the outpatient physical therapy run at least one day before we can let you go."

Tony grumbled and held the cotton ball Jim shoved into his hand in place over his arm. "I don't need physical therapy, I need whiskey therapy."

"Don't we all," Jim replied from further away. Tony heard the clink of vials being slipped into a case and the snap of his gloves coming off.

"Guess we're done for now?" Tony asked, leaning back into his pillows. He had gotten a little overexcited about leaving, but hey, could you blame him? Two months was a long time to be stuck in the hospital when nothing else was wrong with him other than the obvious.

"I'll be back with a razor in an hour. I have a few more patients to check on," Jim's voice came from the doorway.

"And pudding," Tony demanded.

"But your _lovely_ figure."

"Fuck my figure, your wife makes godly pudding."

There was a bark of laughter and the door closed with a snap.

Was his beard that bad? All this time no one said a thing, not even Clint, and Clint was the type to make every joke in the book about something like that. Tony scowled to himself and tossed the cotton ball onto his bed. The bastard was probably sneaking pictures of it, or something.

Tony ran a hand over his chin, and then remembered a certain god doing the same thing right before he kissed him.

"Oh fuck, he kissed me while I looked like fucking Tom Hanks?"

Tony let his hand drop, and realized he was unsettled by the wrong thing, again. Loki, bad guy, Tony good. No kissing should happen whether he had a beard or not.

_For fucks sakes, Stark, you're such a slut._

He kicked his feet in irritation, and was greeted by a grunt.

"Whoa, who the fuck—?!"

"It's me."

Tony let out a sharp breath and put a hand on his chest. "For fucks sake, Rudolf, you need to tie a bell to your horns or something."

A hand brushed across his legs, causing him to jump again, and there was a strange pop.

"Wait... Loki?"

"I am still here," the god replied, and Tony felt a body shift over his. "You seem happy today, why?"

Tony grunted as the body invaded his space, but didn't feel quite bothered enough to tell him to fuck off.

"I'm being released soon," he replied with a small smile, "so, I guess no more visits from you, huh? I can't see you coming to the tower to read to me."

"Ah... so you will be healed?"

"Uh... no, this is kind of... permanent."

Again, Loki's fingers brushed across his eyelids, and just like last time, Tony leaned into the touch. The god traced each eyelid slowly, and Tony could almost feel him thinking.

"I'll have to walk with a cane, I guess. Or a dog." He paused, and his smile started to slip away. "No, not a dog, I don't want a dog. Rogers is more than enough of a puppy for one tower. Maybe I can tie a harness around him and use him to cross the road, or—"

"Shh," Loki hushed him, and Tony trailed off reluctantly. Silence only made him think, and he was trying so damn hard not to think.

He didn't want to walk with a cane, he didn't want a seeing-eye dog. He didn't want any assistants, or pity, or any fucking _help_.

Tony bit his lip to try to keep back the frustrated sob that crawled its way up his throat. He knew Loki heard it when the god made a small sound in response, and long arms closed around him suddenly.

That was too much for him. Too much because even Bruce didn't hug him, because no one hugged him. Because he didn't let anyone hug him and now someone was doing it anyway and it was too fucking _much_. The second sob was louder, unrestrained, and his fingers curled against the fabric of Loki's shirt. The god's arms tightened around him and he cried, and cried, and cried.

_

"Do you feel better now?" Loki asked, what felt like hours later.

"I feel gross and bloated, and embarrassed as fuck, so no, not really," Tony replied honesty, and wiped at his face a few more times. He had finally settled down enough to let the god go and try to pick up whatever pieces were left of his shattered dignity. It didn't seem to matter, though, because somehow Loki wasn't laughing or sneering at him. He even whipped Tony's nose with a sleeve at one point.

"You're different," he said after taking a few more shuddering breaths.

"As are you, Stark."

"Yeah, i'm blind, but you're like an entire 180 different."

Loki was silent, and Tony started to fidget with the sheets as he waited. Wrong question, again?

"No," Loki muttered at last, "I am not different. I am as I were, but tired."

Tony allowed him this, anyone would be tired after trying to take over an planet and then spent the next year or so with your hands pressed like paper.

"Still, doesn't explain your presence here, or the fact that you allowed my mortal snot all over your shirt."

Loki laughed at that, and Tony almost laughed too. Because the god sounded so... silly. He guessed that this weird giggle was Loki's real laugh, not the bag-of-cats cackle from before. It was actually kind of heart warming to hear, as ridiculous as it sounded when he matched it with his mental image of Loki.

"I have no reason to explain my motives to you, and thank you for reminding me, you owe me a shirt."

Tony made a face. "Can't you just magic yourself a new one?"

"_No_."

Tony frowned at the rawness i'm his voice and wondered, not for the first time, exactly _how_ Loki escaped from his prison.

"Uh, okay then. Can I buy you one when i'm out of here?"

"You speak as though you shan't be handing me over to Thor as soon as you escape this prison."

"Loki, if I was going to 'hand you over' to Thor, which, by the way, is physically impossible for me right now... but if I _was_ going to, I would have done it already. You know he was here, do you see him anywhere?"

Loki hummed, and cold hands pressed against his face gently. It was a nice relief from the heat all that crying stirred up. They remained silent for a while, and it didn't bother him this time. Well, until he remembered Jim and his impending shave.

"Shit, Loki," he grunted, sitting up and pushing the god's hands away from his face, "you gotta go. My doctor's coming back any minute now."

Loki huffed in either amusement it annoyance, and stood up from the bed. "You truly do intend to keep me a secret, you strange man."

"Are you complaining?" Tony asked, and held his breath when the usual brush of a kiss graced his forehead.

"Not one bit. I rather like being a secret."

"I'm going to be locked away for a very long time if anyone finds out I sat here and let you feed me fucking fruit for weeks and weeks."

"No, I would not let that happen."

Tony arched a brow and waited for more of an explanation. He got none, and there was that crackle in the air again that told him he was alone.

"Fucker," he muttered just as the door opened.

"And here I brought you the pudding," Jim said is a teasing tone, "This is how you treat me?"

"Not you, well _yes _you, but not you this time."

Jim laughed and tossed a spoon onto the bed.

"Careful, I've got that bloody cotton ball floating around down there, don't want things to get contaminated, do we?"

"Tony, disgusting. Throw stuff in the trash, it's right next to your bed."

There was a shuffling of a coat being taken off, and hands brushed over his legs looking for the cotton ball.

"Huh, don't see it. Maybe you threw it harder than you think."

Tony frowned for a moment before shrugging it off as unimportant.

"Now that you have brought me sustenance, make me beautiful."

He could almost feel Jim shaking his head at him as he offered him a hand up from the bed. Tony allowed his help with a little less fuss than usual, and seated himself in the plastic chair.

Jim plugged the razor in, turning it on and off before he spoke from somewhere to his left, "You seem to be more eager, got a hot date?"

Tony was about to deny it, before a sly grin slowly formed across his face.

"Yeah, actually, I _do_."

He had shirt to buy. 


	3. Den of Lions

He should have known. Why? Because he should have fucking known.

Apparently, not doing much more than laying around in a bed for months at a time makes it hard to walk normally again. Add a nice dose of I-can't-see, and the number of falls outnumbered the number of steps actually taken.

He knew the nurses were laughing at him, especially when he swore up a storm, laying on the cold hospital floor after a rather spectacular tumble. It wasn't like he was having a fit, no crying or kicking his feet, yet they still treated him like a kid.

So, he got frustrated, it wasn't like he'd ever been blind before, there's no test drive to see if you like it or not.

"_Try_ it sometime," he snapped, and that was the last time they laughed.

Jim was a blessing, and coming from a blazing Atheist such as himself, that was saying something. Not only did the man bring him pudding for all nine of the extra days he was forced to stay, he trimmed Tony's beard, let him have company after hours, and even stopped by to play a game of chess when he had time. As much as he hated the extra days there, it wasn't as bad as it could have been. All the same, he was glad to be out of there, and bid his blessing-doctor a rather quick goodbye.

"Fresh air! Oh, how I've missed you!"

"You're full of shit," Clint snorted, "you live and breathe air-conditioning. You're a canned-air man."

"Trauma changes everything."

"Yeah, like your weight."

Clint cursed when Tony's brand new cane smacked the back of his head. Tony grinned. He was getting good at this whole blind thing, that was the third time he got the archer when he aimed to.

Well, practice makes perfect. He hit him again, for science.

"You keep this up and i'm signing you into the psych ward," Clint warned, his voice further away. See, you can teach a monkey new tricks. Now to get him to stop trying to feed Tony dates before Tony pulled an Indiana Jones on him.

"Bad dates," he threatened, and Clint snorted from even further away.

The banter was helping Tony distract himself from his other problem. His god problem. Loki did not return for the past nine days, and just like that feeling he had when Thor mused about the god's possible death, Tony had a strong feeling about it. Like maybe, just maybe, he was wrong.

It was probably just paranoia, and why did he care in the first place? God of lies, the man who caused the deaths of some number of people that only Steve bothered to remember. Tony didn't remember that shit, with his kind of personality, it would drown him. Good for Steve, though, all that patriotism must keep him afloat.

Tony scowled as he slipped into the seat of, what must have been, a limo, because he had to scrunch down practically to the ground. Plus, it just felt extra large inside, like a cave. Caves... no, why was he thinking about that? Fuck, he woke up with an extra side of bitter today. It just _had_ to be the day of his release, too.

"Where are we going, anyway?" he asked as the car began to move.

Clint hummed something, and damn he was far away. Definitely a limo. "Back to the tower, I guess. There's a sort of team meeting planned for the second you step foot through the door. Bruce baked."

Tony leaned back into the leather, and didn't bother to hide his ever growing scowl.

"I'll pay you good money to sneak me in by one of your millions of ninja ways I know you have in and out of the tower."

"How much is 'good money'?"

"A thousand dollars?"

Clint huffed.

Tony rolled his eyes in a familiar gesture that just felt weird to do when you didn't go on a mini world-spinning joyride every time. It was just blackness. He needed to stop rolling his eyes.

"Fine, you name the price, I'll pay it. Deal is void if they catch us."

"I'll make you a list," Clint began, and then amended, "I'll make you a list and read it out loud in an obnoxious, British voice."

Tony tensed, Clint must have noticed, and he really didn't know why he bothered to try to hide shit from the spies in the first place. He heard the leather of the seat creak a little, and Clint's voice came from much closer, "you really don't want to see them, huh?"

"No, I _don't_."

Tony almost sighed in relief at the archer's misunderstanding for his discomfort. Not that Clint would have any clue why anything British would trigger anything for him, but why risk it? Then again, it wasn't as though he was seeing Loki on his own accord, the god came to him.

_Uh huh, but you lied about it. _

_It's complicated, _he argued.  
_R__emember when you thought he was just weird?_ _Yeah, turns out he's not even human, go you._

He was _not_ thinking about Loki, not at all. In fact, if he was, he was thinking about handing Loki over to Thor. Tony went on ignoring the tiny voice in his head that whispered, "_liar._" A voice that sounded suspiciously like Loki, go figure.

"Oh, did you know Thor's back?" Clint called out suddenly, "He knocked over that vase Pepper set up in the lobby, the huge Chinese one, and she came in—I swear to god— two seconds later and had a _fit_. I've never seen a god get berated before, coulda' sold tickets," Clint huffed and added, "should have."

Tony stiffened right back up again at the mention of two more people he didn't want to think about. No point in lying about seeing Thor, the god was never anything but honest, and Clint knew Pepper was a sore subject. It wasn't like the archer was Mr. Sensitive, there were no difficult subjects for him, as long as the man was talking about someone else. The bastard.

Tony cleared his throat and admitted,"Uh... yeah, I did know, actually. He came to say hi and break a perfectly good chair."

"He's always breaking things. I'd like to know what they make his shit out of in Asgard, because apparently 'Midgard has weak furnishings'."

"His shit is probably pure gold," Tony replied dryly and Clint hooted with laughter. It was too loud, and sharp, and the archer was clearly a little on edge. Tony wondered if it was him causing it, or something else. Maybe Natasha had him i'm the dog house. She had seemed tense last time she visited, then again, she was always tense.

As per their 'ninja' agreement, the limo stopped a block away, and they walked the rest of the way. Clint didn't help him with navigation or bother to alert him if he was about to run into poles, or carts, or other people. Half of him was thankful for that, the other half just wanted to walk five feet without gaining another bruise.

By the time they made it indoors, Tony was sure he was limping, and also secretly agreed with Clint: he did live for air-conditioning.

"Where are we?"

"Service entrance," Clint replied in a whisper, as if the entire team could hear them twenty-something floors down. "not as 'ninja' as I would like, but you can't exactly crawl through the vents like that."

Tony paused, his grip tightening on the long, white and red cane. He was home, or one of his homes, and it felt completely strange to him.

"JARVIS?" He called out softly.

"Welcome home, sir. I am glad to see you in one piece."

"I am the picture of wholesome health," he quipped and jumped when Clint's hands fastened themselves around his arm and pulled him away. "Fuck you, i'm talking here."

"Fuck _you_, I want my money so go lock yourself in a room already."

"Bad dates."

"You're the one who eats them," Clint reminded, pulling him closer and stopping suddenly.

"I never ate a single—" Tony stumbled when the room moved, and reminded himself that yes, he lived in the 21st century, and that rooms which move are called _elevators_. "I never ate a single date."

"Then where did they all go?" Clint asked from his right.

Tony shrugged, he couldn't be bothered to remember where the disgusting things went. Did he throw them out, or did someone else eat them? The little voice in the back of his head woke up again and whispered, "_Loki_".

_Fuck._

Clint's shifted and Tony could feel his eyes on him, "Fuck what?"

"Did I say that out loud? If I didn't, and you're a mind reader, read this," he said, picturing him holding Clint down and shoving dates in places they should not go.

"You're fucking mental, I know I should have signed you back in."

"Nah," Tony denied lazily, "I've got my own padded cell right here."

The door opened with a bell sound that sounded like it was tolling from hell, and Tony wondered who decided _that_ suited the elevator. Surely he didn't design that in the building's plans? Okay, so Pepper talked him down from having AC/DC blare out when you arrived, but he sure as hell didn't instal that hell-bell.

"Where is this elevator, anyway?" He asked, stepping out tentatively.

"We're in the back hall that leads to the regular elevator," Clint replied as he passed him, adding a less certain, "I think."

Tony followed blindly, (ha ha ha—no) and almost sighed when he felt the space open up. He stumbled right away on a low seated chair, and decided to sit before he added to his collection of bruises. He had done enough tango dancing today.

"Alright, i'm here, they're there, you get your money."

"Aww money, yes!"

"Selfish bastard,"Tony said, almost fondly, and dug around in his pocket for his wallet. Flipping it open, he automatically reached for the card section and froze. _Oh_, right, how the hell was he supposed to know which cards were which?

"Clint, tell me what your elf eyes see, is this gold?"

"Fuck you, and no."

"This one?"

"Nnnooope, it's silver though, close enough."

Tony flicked the card towards his voice, heard the tell-a-tail squawk, and made another check for himself.

5-0, he was in the lead.

"Take that, spend money, bring it back when you're done," he instructed, and tucked his wallet away.

Clint heaved a weary sigh. "Yes, dad, whatever you say dad, i'm going to spend it all, _dad_."

"Good, now clear out so I can enjoy my padded room to myself."

There was a pause before Clint shuffled out that sounded suspiciously like someone flipping the bird. He found himself grinning and gave the man the one finger salute before he heard a laugh down the hall.

"You scare me sometimes!" Clint called back, and there was the hell-bell sound, and then nothing.

Tony turned his head, as if miming 'looking around' would make the room suddenly appear. Everything felt alien, and not the fun feed-you-and-read-to-you kind. It felt wrong, and all his hopes of home, of some shred of normalcy, took a swan dive out the window.

"Welcome home," he said to the empty room, and wished he was anywhere else but here.

* * *

"Tony!"

"Tony, come on, this is childish."

Tony laughed and didn't move from where he had curled up the night before, which, funnily enough, was in the same chair he first sat down in.

"Tony, come on, let us in," Steve begged, and begging sounded worse on him than hero speeches.

"No," he replied calmly, tucking his face behind his folded up knees. Jarvis had turned on the face-to-face camera at the door, useless for him, but great for letting his team mates peer at him through their own screen.

"You're going to have to come out of there at some point," Bruce reminded him from behind the door. "So come on, I made pancakes."

Tony tipped his head up, giving them a smirk. "So the honorable Dr. Banner is not above bribery, I see."

"Nope, i'm not," Bruce admitted, "and they're chocolate chip."

"Mmm, good bribe."

"So, come on?"

"No."

There was a frustrated shake of the door handle, and Tony grinned behind his knees. Maybe he could get Bruce to Hulk out, that would be fun.

_No_, he reminded himself, it probably wouldn't and Bruce would feel miserable and apologize for a month.

Tony sighed, "just go away, i'm learning the room again."

"You're sitting in a chair, Stark," came Natasha's voice, and when did the whole gang arrive?

"Sitting, learning, I can multitask."

"How did he even get inside?" Steve was asking, and the thought-filled pause was comedy gold.

"Clint!"

"You'll never catch me alive!" The archer screeched, and there was the sound of feet trampling down the stairs. Tony threw his head back and cackled.

"He's lost it," someone muttered from behind the door again, and Tony just beamed.

"Well, if you get hungry for something other than scotch, you know where the pancakes are."

Tony waved cheerfully at the door, or where he thought the door was, and went back to 'learning the room', which was basically just him sitting there trying not to have a god damn panic attack.

This was his home, the place he had lived in for over a year, the penthouse he had rebuilt after Loki destroyed half of it. Oh yeah, that reminded him, he should bill the god for repairs.

Tony frowned to himself and tucked his knees a little closer to his chest. He didn't miss the god, that was ridiculous. He probably just missed not having to feed himself, oh, and books. He refused to let anyone teach him brail, for pride reasons. But those cool hands on his face, that touch that made him relax in ways he didn't think was possible anymore. He missed that, he missed feeling like he was, well, home.

Tony tightened his arms around his knees and thought, _shit, I have problems_.

He then vaguely wondered if he called the god's name three times in front of a mirror, if he would show up to kill Tony. He didn't have a mirror, but it was worth a try.

'_Suicidal_,' whispered that voice again, and Tony said the name out loud.

Of course, there was nothing. He should have known. Why? Because he—

"You called me."

Tony jerked his head up, looking towards where the cool—was that stunned?—British-sounding voice came from.

"I did," he admitted softly, "you came."

"You _called_ me," the voice repeated, much closer, and Tony reached out to find the god's chest right in front of him. He must have been kneeling, because Tony was practically on the floor in this chair. Huh, so he _could_ get the god to kneel to him, file that away for a rubbing-in-face moment later.

"Welcome to the proverbial 'den of lions'," he joked, sliding his hand up to find a sharp cheekbone. Tony ran his thumb along it to an ear, and he broke out in a grin when he wiggle said ear and got a hiss of annoyance.

"Just because you cannot see, does not give you an excuse to paw at my face," Loki stated firmly, and because Tony was himself, he absolutely _had_ an excuse and started sliding his other hand up Loki's right cheek.

"Just making sure it's really you, you know, for security reasons."

One hand traced the god's jaw, tickled his chin, and then moved down the long tendons of his neck. He felt Loki tense, and laughed, "what do you think i'm going to do? You could swat me across the room like a bug."

"Do not tempt me, then," Loki replied, his voice reverberating through the skin under Tony's fingers. His other hand came up, tracing Loki's high hairline with a wicked grin, and then slid down his nose with a playful 'bop!' at the end. Loki was tensing up again, shifting like a cat ready to bolt, and just out of spite, Tony ran a thumb over the lips he had been kissed with so many times. His grin fell away instantly, heat pricking his skin as he trace the lower lip a second time and whoa, okay, touching lips changed the mood quickly.

Tony tried to say something, anything—what the hell _was_ this atmosphere?

"Uh, I... You—" he choked, because Loki was a little shit, too, and something wet and hot brushed against Tony's finger. The thing was, he couldn't just remove it now, no, now he had to know about said thing brushing across the pad of his finger. For science.

The little voice chimed in, "_liar_", and he was really too distracted to care.

He leaned forward, his thumb now pulling Loki's lip open, and just before Tony's lips brushed his, he muttered,"I'm completely fucking _insane_," and swore he heard a, "me as well," before they kissed.

It was nothing like the other kisses, those butterfly-wing brushes against his forehead, or even the slow, chaise kiss before Loki disappeared. No, this was a kiss Tony knew how to handle, all tongue and teeth and those little breaks for air you needed before you dove back in, and god, he was _drowning_.

Loki hummed, pulling his body into a firm grip, and chilly fingers began to creep up the back of his shirt.

Fuck, Tony was drowning.

He pulled away suddenly, pushing back just enough to put a gap between them, but not enough to escape those arms. He could sense Loki going rigid again, as if waiting for the other shoe to drop. Or was it the first shoe? Had they dropped a shoe already?

Tony shook his head and rasped, "what are you doing here?"

"I believe I am kissing you, unless you Midgardans have another name for it," Loki huffed.

"Yeah, I mean no, but _why_?"

And wasn't that a loaded question. Why was Loki kissing him, why was _he_ kissing him back? Was that all it took, a few weeks of unprecedented pampering, and hey, let's kiss the enemy? Also, why did he feel so fucking wired suddenly?

"There are... reasons," Loki ground out, pushing Tony the final few steps and disappearing from the inventor's hands. Tony's senses screamed, and he instantly reached out for him, his fingers curling in the rough fabric of Loki's shirt.

"Don't leave," he ordered softly, and okay, begging didn't sound so great on him either.

"I wasn't, I simply... I... I should leave."

The way his voice cut out, faltered, told Tony he was unsure. Unsure if he should stay, or leave, or throw Tony out the window, maybe. But for the god who Tony labeled as a 'smooth criminal' to sound so lost, made something in his chest flip-flop unpleasantly.

"Stay," Tony ordered more firmly, this time, "we don't have to talk about it, I don't even like talking, I mean I do, but not_ talking_ talking. I like talking about other stuff, we could just talk about the weather, no kissing, or maybe kissing, talking, or we could..." He trailed off, realizing he just said 'talk' and all forms whereof seven times. "Just... _stay_."

Loki pulled against his fingers, and Tony remembered the cat image he got from before. He was going to bolt, Tony's super-smooth words had failed to convince him. Genius, they said, very smart, they said.

_Fuck._

"Loki..." He began again.

"Stark, I _must_ go," Loki interrupted, pulling free at last. "I have things I must attend to."

Tony's hand hovered in the air where he lost the connection to the god. The room came rushing back in around him, too wide, too unfamiliar, and he was drowning again.

"Loki, can you plea—" his words cut off at the familiar sound of the god disappearing.

Snap, crackle, pop, you're alone again.

'_Just like you wanted_,' the little nasty voice reminded, and Tony mentally flipped it off. His hand went out to find the chair, but at some point he and Loki had shifted far enough away that he couldn't find it anymore.

Frowning, Tony tried to move to his left, one knee met a coffee table, and he was sent sprawling. He wasn't fast enough, because he couldn't track it with his eyes, or just because he wasn't fucking _fast_ enough, and his head met the coffee table too. There was a flicker, just for a second, of lights and colors, before he hit the floor and it was nothing but darkness again. Not the painless darkness that he wanted, no, just the same old dark he had been living in for months. Same old nothing, with lots of pain, and as he lay there, he felt the warm trickle of blood start to creep down his forehead. He laughed sharply, and it quickly turned into a choked sob.

"_You wanted to be alone_," the voice said again, and the room was too big, too alien, and he was drowning.


	4. Help, I'm Alive

Someone was touching him, and Tony opened his eyes. It still remained a 'someone', because oh yeah, blind.

"I don't have anything valuable on me," he gurgled, and frowned at the weirdness of his voice.

"Is that your conditioned response to waking up, because if it is, I pity you."

Tony grunted, "Bruce, how'd you get in here? And yeah, it is when I wake up to a nice, mysterious fondling."

"I still pity you."

"Have fun with that," Tony snarked, and sat up. The world decided to throw him off her back and if it weren't for said fondling hands, he would have been right back on the floor. At least, he had a feeling he was still on the floor, and yep, there was the coffee table to his left. Tony kicked a foot at it, regretted it immediately, and flipped it off like the mature adult that he was.

Bruce was touching him again, and asking, "what happened?"

Tony snorted and batted away his probing fingers. "It's no great mystery, is it? I mean, _hello_," he groused, waving a hand in front of his eyes.

Bruce jabbed at his head again, much harder than before, and Tony knew he had pushed a few buttons there. Maybe he could get him to Hulk out.

His inner scientist _really_ needed to stop thinking that.

"Tony, I know you're still mad at me—"

"I'm not."

"—and i'm sorry for leaving you there. I just... I thought I might hurt people."

"I know," Tony replied, no longer squirming away. "I _get _it, I got it when you told me, too. I was just pitching a fit like the old man-child that I am."

Bruce huffed, and Tony hoped it was an amused sound, not an aggravated one. For a while after that, the man worked in silence, cleaning Tony's face with something that smelled like alcohol and sticking a bandage over his cut. Tony poked at it as soon as Bruce pulled his hands away.

"Hmm, you feel oddly cold to the touch," Bruce pondered, "how are you feeling? Hot? Dizzy? Do you have chills?"

With a dramatic sigh, Tony lolled his head back, answering in a monotone, "normal body temperature, no chills, sir, shall I walk in a straight line, _sir_? Oh wait, I'll probably run into another table."

"Sir," JARVIS interrupted, "Your body temperature is at a dangerously low 95.6."

Tony tried to glare at the ceiling in the split second before the predicted freak-out came.

"What?!" Bruce shouted, hands instantly going for Tony's face, and he remembered how nice Jim was to always warn him before he touched him. "I _thought_ you felt cold, Tony, you must be really sick!"

"I feel fine, Bruce, it's just a little low and—"

"This is not just a little low! Low body temperature—"

"—I don't even _feel_ cold or—"

"—A sign of low metabolism which is something you've never had a problem with before," Bruce continued right over him, "Tony, you have to go back in. They still don't know what ended up in your blood stream, hell _I_ don't even know what chemicals you were using, you won't tell me."

Tony snapped his mouth shut and turned his head away. It's not that he didn't _want_ to tell him, he did like to brag and Bruce could always improve upon his chemical warfare any day, but he wasn't allowed to tell him. He was bound by law, and SHIELD not to tell anyone what he was working on.

And now what, though, what was he supposed to do when something was obviously wrong with him and no one was allowed to know what he did? What changed since he left the hospital, other than smacking his head?

That voice piped up, '_Loki._..' and Tony swore internally. He licked at his lips as if he could still taste the god on them.

"I can't tell you, Bruce," he explained lamely, "you _know_ why."

"Fuck SHIELD, I can't help you if I don't know what's hurting you!"

Tony couldn't help it, he snorted. Bruce had a long standing love/hate relationship with SHIELD, and Tony loved it when it leaned more towards hate and the curses came out. Whoever thought Bruce was the delicate flower out of the two of his personalities, was stupid or blind. Well, not blind.

Bruce huffed again, and this time Tony could tell he was annoyed. "Don't laugh, i'm being serious."

With a hand up in defeat, Tony pulled his knees up to his chest and rested his chin on them. He hadn't failed to notice his knew way of sitting, and how polar-opposite it was to how he used to sit, wide open, lounging, relaxed.

_Shut up_, he told himself, _the world doesn't need you psychoanalyzing yourself_.

"Bruce," he said at last, "I can't tell you, no matter _how_ serious you are. I'm in enough shit with them as it is, and they took all my work after it blew up in my face. Even if I _could_ explain it, we literally have no samples to compare or test with. More importantly, i'm fine."

"Tony..."

"I'm_ fine_," he repeated more firmly.

"No, you're _not_," Bruce denied softy, and Tony was being touched again. He never got a warning, but at least this time it was a nice touch. Just a hand across his shoulders, enough to sooth some of the crazy stress levels in his muscles. "Tony, you should head back to the hospital."

Tony shook his head sharply, and tucked his face down further behind his knees. "No. No way. I just got home, i'm going to stay here, eat pancakes, and then go back to avoiding everyone."

"You only want me for my pancakes."

"I use you for your baking skills," Tony joked and grinned behind his knees.

"You're a shit. Why should I feed you, you shit?"

Tony directed his blank gaze at him and full-on pouted as he replied, "because I am a poor little blind boy who hasn't eaten in two days and you are a big, green softy who makes the best pancakes in the world and who loves me soooooo—"

"Oh god, stop," Bruce begged, pushing Tony away with a playful shove. "Stop making that face, my glasses are cracking."

"Rude."

"You started it."

"What is this, the third grade? If I lick it, is it mine?"

Bruce laughed at last, and Tony could almost hear him shaking his head. "Says the one who's pouting about pancakes. Come on," Bruce grunted, the shuffling of clothing and the new angle of his hand proving that he has stood up.

Tony reached out hesitantly, but allowed himself to be hauled up,off the floor. "I don't 'spose I get pancakes and still get to avoid those guys."

"Nope."

Tony sighed, and allowed Bruce to lead him through the maze of furniture. "I knew, deep down, that you hated me."

"Not that deep," Bruce joked, and Tony heard the pleasant ding of the regular elevator. He really needed to fix that other one, just thinking about it made him feel like the devil was lurking somewhere down that hallway.

"Why are we friends again?" He asked sarcastically, leaning against the back wall for support.

"Pancakes."

"Science."

"That too," Bruce acknowledged.

Tony grumbled,"I'm going to hate you for a little bit, for this."

"I'll live."

Tony smiled bitterly, and flinched when the pleasant ding alerted him of their arrival to hell.

_I might not._

* * *

Hands shaking, lips set in a thin line, Loki tried his spell a second time.

The first spell had moved in the wrong direction, taking away more than what the universe could give back, and for a sickening moment Loki thought he had killed the mortal. That would have been disastrous, for _both_ of them.

"You _must_ work, I have the blood of both in the contract!" He hissed at the bowl in front of him, as if by his feeble command, the rune magic would simply bend to his will. His wrist was left bleeding from the first attempt, and he squeezed more from his veins into the bowl. He was becoming desperate, he knew, but he was out of time. Thor had come, and with him would be more Asgardian 'justice'.

_No._

No more pain, not like that. It was not the broken bones that he dreaded, nor the sting of spelled metal against his crushed flesh. Not even his sewn lips, that had begun to rot and fester were as painful. No, none of his wounds hurt him as much as the splitting of his soul, his being, his magic. What they took away from him, was much more of himself than they could ever understand, and in his desperation to escape, he made a _mistake_.

But now he was faced with a similar desperation. He would not return there, and especially not thanks to his foolish misstep with the contract. He would amend that as soon as he could, and rid himself of this appalling need to be near the mortal.

Loki licked his lips and carefully lay the cotton ball in the small bowl, setting it afloat in the pool of his own blood. The runes shimmered gold, his blood began boiling inside of him and out, and the cotton ball burned into nothing in a sudden flash of red fire.

"NO!" Loki screamed, his fingers clutching at the last of the burnt fibers in bowl. He stared down hopelessly, desperately recalculating and planning until something deep inside of him snapped. With a howl of rage, he sent the bowl smashing into the kitchen cupboards. The table, upturned with such force, it too was sent flying across the room. His blood spilled across the ugly, white tiling, ash and wax joining as it spread.

He was panting from his sudden outburst, and Loki clutched at his bleeding wrist, trying to stop the flow.

"I need more..." Loki muttered deliriously, "I must get _more_ from him..."

A small voice whispered in his mind, '_you will kill him._'

Loki sneered, "I care not!"

'_Liar._'

Loki turned away from the mess in his small kitchen, limping into the second of the three rooms that made up his new accommodations. It was small, dingy, and not somewhere he would call a home. But it served its purpose for what he hoped would be a short stay on Midgard. He curled up on the sunken couch that was his only other piece of furniture other than the table. The one he had just undoubtedly ruined. He had no need for a bed, because the second he fell asleep, the nightmares began.

He did not need sleep, he did not need comfort, he did not need that foolish mortal who was so warm and who smiled at him as though...

_He does not know me for what I really am._

Loki pulled his knees to his chest, an old habit he had taken up as the years grew colder and crueler.

"I do _not_ care," he said to the empty room, "what affections I show are merely the product of the contract and nothing more. I have no need for such a weak, _broken_ creature."

'_Liar_,' the voice whispered again, and Loki would not argue with it any longer, for fear of being wrong.

He sat in silence, because he did not _need_ sleep, and watched his only shirt redden with his blood.

* * *

Twenty miles away, Tony shivered.

_Someone just walked over my grave. Did people still say that, or think that, in my case. Besides, I don't have a grave, so how does that phrase work, did zombies come up with this and somehow both the phrase and the walking dead are now integrated into society?_

Tony shoved another bite of pancake into his mouth, a large dribble of syrup heading down his chin. Someone was talking loudly, not yelling, because America used the authoritative loud voice. America did_ not_ yell.

Damn, he acknowledged that he knew who was speaking. It was much harder to pretend they didn't exist when one did that.

"Tony, can you _please_ explain to me why you felt the need to sneak in here and—"

_So if there are zombies in our society, do they have their own, private economy? A closed system, maybe, that—_

"— and secondly, don't bribe other team members with money to get them to do things, that's just—"

"Bruce is bribing me with pancakes," he interrupted, and winced. Fuck it all, he had been doing _so_ well in the ignoring game.

"Tony," Bruce warned from across the table. "That's not the same and you know it."

"I don't hear Clint complaining," Tony pointed out, and gave up on eating because he kept missing his mouth for some reason, and pancakes were much stickier than strawberries. "Actually, I haven't heard Clint at all, did you kill him? I want my card back."

Clint's voice joined in from somewhere across the room, "I'm just being quiet because if I open my mouth some of Steve's hot air will get in."

Tony barked out a laugh, and could almost feel the disapproving glare he earned from the soldier.

Tony said, "I'm not hurting anyone—"

"Except yourself," Steve reminded dryly.

"—_and_ I don't see why that's the thing you have an issue with. We all know what the big, blind, elephant in the room is."

Well that shut them up, all however many of them were there at the moment. He could never rely on his hearing to know if Natasha was around, unless he tried echo location, maybe. Maybe he could become Batman, or the Manbat, wait, wasn't the Manbat a villain? Well, he wasn't much hero material in the first place, but 'sleeping with the enemy' was probably one step further away from heroism. Tony chuckled to himself, then remembered he had people probably looking at him with a nice little array of 'what the fuck is wrong with him?' expressions.

"Okay, so I might have forgotten how to talk to people," he admitted quietly, pushing away from the table and leaning back in his chair. "The main point is, other than how fantastic your pancakes are, Brucey baby, is that i'm not a part of the team anymore. Now personally, I would say that means I don't need to come to anymore team meetings and listen to Steve berate me for whatever he berates me for these days—I stopped listening a year ago—but according to you guys, I still _have_ to come. What, exactly, am I bringing to the table these days? I mean, other than some extremity of mine smashing into it."

There was a shuffling of feet, and Tony's fake smile almost slipped. Nervous shifting? That meant pity, and pity meant they had come up with some cute little title for him to still 'be a part of the team'.

"You would be staying on as a Strategical Consultant," Steve answered, and yep, there it was.

Tony leaned forward, his useless eyes narrowing almost as thin as his patience. "Strategical... Consultant..."

"Yes, you would be in our ear while we work, our home base, you—"

"So, I'll be Batgirl after her fucking spine is broken."

Steve falter and asked, confusion lacing his voice, "What? What are you even _talking_ about?"

"I know what _i'm_ talking about, do you?" He asked nastily, hoping his glare was directed at Steve. "I'm talking about the 'useful' position crafted around the cripple to make them feel like they _belong_. To make me feel like i'm doing good, and still a team player."

"Tony," Bruce warned again, and this time Tony heard it, the pity in his voice.

_No Bruce, Et tu, Brutus?_

Tony continued on, his irritation growing with every turn, "I hate to fucking break it to you all, actually I don't, I'm not a team player, I never was, and I don't fucking care about your little pity job. I _quit_."

Clint whistled, low and impressed, and he knew it was Clint because no one else did that. He felt Bruce tensing up from across from him, and Tony wondered how he had never _felt_ that before. It was like the barometric pressure building up before a thunder storm. Speaking of thunder storms, where was the resident rain-maker? Out looking for Loki, probably. Good, he didn't want to lie to his face right now, he was feeling vulnerable enough, surrounded by the angry, do-gooders.

"Stark," Steve began again.

'_Oh no, the last name came out!' _Tony's inner voice cried sarcastically.

"You can't just give up because it's hard. You can _fight_ this, and you can continue to utilize your skills as a strategist and a brilliant inventor."

"Whoa there, easy on the compliments, National Anthem," Tony said, throwing his hands up, "i'm not buttered up that easily, and also, fight _what_, exactly? My dead eyes? Not much of a fight, sort of one sided. I don't have much foresight in battle, and I always get tunnel vision when I spot the enemy. Get it? I'm _hilarious_, and i'm going to go now. Bruce, be my human walking stick."

Steve was making a sputtering sound over Clint's laughter, and somewhere a chair pulled out. He hoped it was Bruce, and not Natasha with a needle for the back of his neck and the promise of SHIELD-style healing. No, the big hand on his shoulder was just radiating warm fuzzy feelings, that or radiation. Tony tipped his invisible hat to the crowd and followed Bruce out of the room amidst stuttering complaints from Steve.

Bruce didn't say anything until the elevator, and when he did, he sounded tired. "He's just trying to help, you know. In his own way."

"I know," Tony replied, "and I don't want it."

"Do you want _any_ help?"

Tony didn't answer, and the small, bastard of a voice in the back of his head said, "_yes, just not from _you."

Tony hadn't thought of Loki the entire time, sans his moment of Thor panic, and he almost felt better as his mind wandered back to the confusing mess that had recently invaded his life. Bruce was saying something as he helped Tony to the couch, something about, 'if you need me, yadda yadda." Tony waved him off with some automatic response, and literally felt the air pulsate around the man.

He _really_ needed to look into that, because, how fascinating.

The elevator came and went, leaving him to his own pity party. It was funny how he allowed himself to steep in it when it was all him, but god forbid if others joined in. Actually, it wasn't funny at _all_, he didn't like pitying himself, and he hated others doing it all the more.

The thing was, what was he going to do? He turned down their token job slot for... what, exactly? It wasn't like he had a prior engagement. In fact, he really hadn't thought of what he was going to do outside of the hospital at all. Hell, he had never really thought of being anything but Iron Man, it was always supposed to be just... _forever_.

Tony swallowed the sickly sweet taste from his mouth. The pancakes felt pretty unhappy in his stomach right now, whether it was stress or simply because he had been living off of pudding and berries for a few months, he didn't know. He reminded himself that he had no way of finding the bathroom and would have to live with the smell of pancake vomit if he didn't, so he forced himself to calm down and just breathe.

Yeah, like that was ever easy.

He felt it coming, stronger than ever before, and he had no way to fight it off. No, he couldn't 'fight this _thing_', he didn't even have a repulser. Not that he could fire on a panic attack, anyway.

His heart fluttered, and away went the breathing. He choked, curling in on himself as though he could protect his body from it.

_Protect your head, always protect your head._

Who told him that the first time? Was it Howard? No... someone...

Someone was touching him, and Tony couldn't open his eyes, and it didn't matter if he did anyway.

"Stark..."

"I don't have anything valuable on me," he choked, half joking, half not.

"Yes," Loki answered, "yes, you _do_."

There was a strange pop again, and Tony flinched, feeling as though someone flicked him in the forehead.

"Loki?" He managed, fingers curling into his chest as he struggled to calm down. Cool fingers brushed across his brow, and a hand pressed over his, adding pressure to his chest.

"Shhh... you are well, you are safe," the voice whispered in his ear, and Tony would have almost believed it, if it wasn't coming from the guy who nearly killed him. Then again...

"Did you... did you know..." He paused to take a deeper breath, and it was surprisingly easy, suddenly. "Did you know your brother almost killed me once? H-hit me full on with lightning, very flashy."

"He is no brother of mine, but no, I did not know you were close to death at the time. I was rather distracted by the light show, myself."

"Not... brother? Oh yeah, the whole... adopted thing."

"_No_," came Loki's answer, and his voice sounded oddly pinched, "no, _that_ was something I could look past, given time."

Tony took a few more deep breaths and sat up, directing his attention fully to the body next to his. Loki was tense, just like the last three times Tony poked at his personal life, or questioned his motives. He frowned, thought about it, and made the connection.

"Your lips..."

"He told you?"

"Sort of, I kind of figured it out from what little he did say," Tony replied carefully. "They're... um, not sewn up anymore."

"An adept observation, Stark."

"I try," he quipped back, and leaned into the god's touch unconsciously. "I just, I heard it was impossible for you to use magic, therefor get out, so i'm kind of wondering how you're here?"

"I used magic, and got out," Loki replied flatly. There was a warning in his tome, but Tony liked to live dangerously.

'_Suicidal_', came the voice.

_Shut up._

"For what it's worth, i'm glad you escaped."

Surprised silence greeted this statement, and Tony nearly chuckled at the mental picture of Loki in his head, eyebrows raised incredulously, maybe a half smirk in there too.

"Do not let your teammates hear you say this, they may think you were glad for this 'war criminal' to be free."

"Firstly, they're not my teammates anymore because I quit, secondly, you were being fucking tortured, they crushed your _hands_, and I don't care who you are, no one deserves that." He furrowed his brow and added. "Well, I can think of a_ few_ people, but that's beside the point."

"So you are no longer the 'plucky hero'?" Loki asked humorously, making a point of avoiding the entire second half of Tony's response.

"Darling, I've never been plucky a day in my life, and the hero bit can be disputed, as well."

Loki laughed, that weird giggle that had almost sent Tony out of his hospital bed in surprise when he first heard it. The cool hand left his brow, and a second later a kiss brushed his skin in its place.

"Well then," Loki whispered against his forehead, "welcome to the proverbial Den of Lions."


	5. Magnetism

When Tony woke up the next morning, he was alone in his bed and if it were any other day, that would have been completely normal. Only, he clearly remembered a certain god tucking him in and stretching out on top of his blankets beside him. He also remembered a hand running through his hair and across his cheeks and suddenly, Tony frowned.

There was something... off. Just for a moment, Tony remembered the feeling of those skinny fingers wrapping around his throat and adding more and more pressure until—_no_, that was impossible. How could he only half remember something as traumatic as being strangled? It must have been a dream, which was perfectly understandable, considering who he had fallen into bed with last night.

Well, not _that_ kind of falling into bed, more , the literal sort of collapsing bonelessly into it with a pleased groan. The previous night spent in the chair had been bad for his back, and worse for his chest. Actually, it sucked over all.

Even now, a day and a night later, he was wheezing and aching all the way through to his chest cavity. Any kind of constricting posture pressed the reactor into his organs, what was left of his rib cage, and sometimes—usually after a good hit to the chest— he could feel it in his spine. Today, luckily, it was mostly limited to his lungs, so he tried to remedy it by stretching out flat on his back and spreading his arms out.

That caused him to let out a few wet coughs, which was probably not a good sign, but fuck it, he was _not_ going back to the hospital. Apparently, the stretching wasn't going to work out today, and sadly, Tony didn't really have a lot of other options right now. Standing came with all sorts of bad karma, including but not limited to crushing his lungs more with the sheer beauty of his arc reactor meeting gravity, the loss of some of his toes as he tried to blindly find his way from room to room, and whatever final dregs of his dignity turning to ash as he is forced to call for someone to help him off the floor or out of the tub or from within the refrigerator.

Tony's stomach reminded him that he hadn't eaten since pancakes and pancakes were forever ago. Right, refrigerator. Where was that god when you needed him?  
A weird flutter behind his reactor made him stop breathing as the memory of strawberries made him crave something more than just food.

What was wrong with him? Seriously, very deadly seriously, what was _wrong_ with him? Loki killed people, not just humans, according to Thor, and meant he was generally what one would find under the definition of a mass murderer, sans the whole alien thing, probably. Tony didn't miss the irony of calling someone else a mass murderer, and not for the first time did he think that they might have something in common.

_It's a morbid hobby to share._

Tony decided that pain might be a welcome distraction to the utter agony of that train of thought, and sat up, one hand already lifting to his reactor as the weight shifted. He groaned without restraint, and pushed himself to the edge of the bed. The hand not trying to hold his chest together flailed around hopelessly for his walking stick, and when none was found, he realized he must have left it in the living room.

It figured, you trust the god of lies as your seeing eye dog, you get trapped in your room with no way out but 'ow'. Tony bit his lower lip, sucked in a nice, deep breath, and slowly worked his way out of his bedroom.

By the time he made it to the kitchen—cold marble countertops, meet hips—he officially hated the game of Operation, since that was what his life boiled down to these days.

_There's a table in the hall._

BZZT!

_Corner of the wall._

BZZT!

_I don't even know what this is but it hurts._

BZZT!

_Maybe I should program JARVIS to make the noise when I hit something because I'm hilarious. Actually...__  
_  
"JARVIS?"

"Good morning sir, or rather, afternoon."

"You know me, early riser," Tony joked and leaned gingerly against the counter. "Can you make a sound when i'm about to smash into something. Make it noticeable, but not annoying. I want to be warned, not driven insane."

A soft 'ping' filled the air in example and Tony nodded, pleased with the sound. It reminded him of the service elevator and the aptly named 'Hell-Bell' and how, maybe, he should get that changed. But that meant having workers in the penthouse, and that was a big 'no' right now. Besides, he had more pressing matters to deal with, and no one used the damn thing anyway, so why keep thinking about it?

He frowned, and called out again, "Hey, where'd Loki go?"

"He left the building about 8 hours ago, sir."

"So how long did he actually stay once I was out?"

There was only a slight pause when JARVIS answered, "3 hours and 27 minutes."

"What?!" Tony squawked, before running a hand over his face. Tony had to remind himself not to ask for JARVIS to 'show' him the video, and instead demanded, "Tell me what did the entire time."

"He appears to have been studying you, and also petting you, which is not as intrusive as kissing, I suppose."

"I love hearing the distaste in your beautiful British voice."

"If you enjoy it, I suggest you continue to stick your tongue down the enemy's throat."

Tony laughed and shook his head with his reply, "you sure know how to encourage a man, but no, I probably _shouldn't_ be doing that."

He paused and ran a hand along the counter. "Although..." He said slowly, picking at the edge of the stone like a nervous child, "There's something about it..."

JARVIS stated in a heavily sarcastic tone, "I believe he is known for his 'Silver Tongue', if that is what you are referring to, sir."

Tony waved him off with a snort and moved his head around to look for the fridge before remembering, yet again, that he couldn't fucking see. That set his mood on edge even more, old habits that died hard and new ones he was going to have to develop.

"On your left," JARVIS reminded more gently, and Tony was thankful the AI didn't have a face to express pity, because Tony would feel more inclined to punch it and that would be unfair to his baby.

"Thanks," he groused and did a sort of blind-man-sideways-shuffle until he found the door handle and opened the refrigerator with a triumphant cry. One open, the bad mood kicked right back in, because:

A: He had _no_ idea what was in there, never mind actually being able to pick and chose things by touch alone

and

B: something smelled like it died twice over, which was good news that no one went in the penthouse as ordered, but Jesus Christ shut the door before you die of poisoning by noxious gas.

"Well JARV, something's rotten in the state of Denmark. Order me something and make them leave it on the table by the elevator."

"The usual?"

"The usual," he confirmed, closing the door quickly. "Not feeling particular exotic after, as you said, sticking my tongue down a god's throat."

"_Enemy,_ sir, the enemy's throat."

"Same thing," Tony grunted as he shuffled out of the kitchen. Soft _pings_ came up right away, and he stiffly walked down the middle of the hall that was actually wide about for three people to walk, but felt horribly claustrophobic when one was living in fear of sharp corners.

He was doing just fine until he forgot that the center part of the living room actually dipped down and he missed the step regardless of the warning _ping_ and fell magnificently to the floor. It was frustrating, of course, but he was no where near as panicked or near-tears as yesterday. Which, actually, was kind of surprising for Tony. He generally had a formula for mental break downs, and this was not how they worked.

It got bad suddenly, like yesterday, and he would go spiraling down, down, down for the next few days. Usually there would be copious amounts of alcohol, which he wouldn't be partaking in until he padded every damn sharp-cornered object in the penthouse because he tended to wander when drunk. But after the crash, Tony would feel great for the next few days, happy, high energy, lots of work done, and then it would really hit him and that's when Tony actually shut down.

That's when he ends up sitting in one of his cars at four in the morning, pretending he's not crying even though no one's around to judge him anyway. That's when he starts to starve himself without meaning to, starts working recklessly just to feel some pain, and uses 'work' as an excuse to really hurt himself.

So, maybe it was the whole blind thing, but for some reason Tony wasn't following his usual crash-and-burn schedule. He actually felt pretty good, which meant he either skipped over the initial spiral and went right into manic-happy time or he was actually handling this way better than he should be.

"_Or perhaps it has something to do with Loki_," that not-so-little-anymore voice posed to him.

"Shut up," Tony snarled, pushing himself up and crawling forward.

_Ping!_

Fuck, where was it?

Tony reached out carefully and found the Devil Coffee Table his skull met with yesterday.

"One point to me," Tony cheered and crawled past it. He was about to pull himself onto the couch when a similar sounding '_ping_' filled the air, causing him to freeze. The elevator doors rattled when they opened, and Tony ducked down to hide behind the couch.

"Hello?"

Tony bit his lip and tried to ignore the nagging voice telling him to stop being such a child and go get your damn food.

"I've got your order... three burgers, one large fry, and uuuh... milkshake?"

"Please bring it to the man cowering behind the furniture in the living room," JARVIS instructed, and Tony glared at the floor. That was a petty piece of revenge for tongue-fucking Loki, but perhaps he had earned it.

Tony popped his head up and waved in the general direction of the elevator, "Hi there!"

He heard a small squeak that could have been either the styrofoam take out containers, or the delivery boy's fear. Tony was voting for the latter.

"Bring it on over," he instructed, and tried to pull himself onto the couch as gracefully as possible. "Tony Stark hungers more by the minute."

"Why were you hiding behind the couch?" The whiny voice asked as it drew closer.

"You never know when an enemy could show up, had to be prepared. Element of surprise and all that."

"Oh yes," JARVIS chimed in, "you were very surprised last night, when the enemy entered your home."

Tony shot the ceiling a glare that he hoped was even more terrifying with the scarring around his eyes.

"Oh shit! Someone broke into the Avengers tower?!" The voice squawked, shoving the food packages into Tony's hands. He nearly dropped them, and had to reign in his death glare, because obviously the kid had never been blind before and therefor didn't know how fucking hard it was to have shit shoved into your hands. Not to mention the whole, 'I don't like things fucking handed to me' thing that nearly sent his precious food to the floor. He managed to hold on to both the food and his temper, and flashed an easy smile.

"We handled it quickly enough," he said smoothly. "Guy never had a chance."

There was a sharp noise, which sounded suspiciously like an AI trying to snort, and Tony ignored it happily.

"Anyway," Tony continued, "ask the lady at the front desk for your tip."

"So you fought him?" The kid asked, and goddamn did this dude not understand the rules of personal space? Tony could actually smell him, which might be his cool new super power if the kid didn't smell like sweat and burger grease.

"Yep, now, why don't you—"

"How'd you do that when you're blind?"

Tony bristled instantly, and the food was carefully placed to his left before he jumped up at the kid. His aim was surprisingly accurate, and one hand halted right over the Adam's apple of his throat, the other aimed to drive the nasal bone up into his brain.

"Just. Like. _That_."

The kid was trembling, and Tony really didn't feel as bad as he should, which was okay because he never felt as bad as he should, but he let him go all the same and sat back down.

"Now off you go," he shooed him away, "save the world, one burger at a time."

He could hear the nervous swallow all the way across his newly earned personal-space bubble, and grinned cheerfully at him, waiting for him to leave.

"T-thank you, sir."

Tony just smiled as he listened to the shuffle of loose fitting jeans—probably hanging off his ass, too—move further away. Somewhere by the elevator, the kid called back, "you still kick ass, Ironman!" Before the doors slid closed with a thunk.

Tony sat in silence for a while, not moving, and certainly not eating. He didn't know how long it was before JARVIS said, "that was rather cruel of you, sir."

"Maybe Loki's rubbing off on me," he snapped, picking at the lid of the food container.

The AI stayed silent, and a few moments later Tony whispered, "I know."

* * *

It was not working, nothing was working. Why was nothing _working_?!

The bowl did not go flying, this time, and Loki prided himself in his restraint. Instead, he returned to the saggy couch in the middle of the living room, and threw himself into it with a defeated sigh.

_Why, oh why, did all things with mortals have to be so complicated?_ Loki thought with a bitter smile.

No, rather, all things to do with _Stark _seemed to be complicated, where as other mortals were _so_ much easier to manipulate. The moment Loki thought he had the man wrapped around his finger, he would do something to break his concentration. Loki would never admit to it being his own fault that Stark fascinated him—a mere curiosity, nothing more—and lay the blame on the man's infuriating ability to change the course of any situation to suit his needs.

Things had just begun to lean towards what he wanted the other night, when Loki was suddenly being pushed away. Stark's expression had been full of want, startlingly so, but his mouth was forming words of denial. Inferring that Loki wanted something from him, something far more than what Loki _actually_ desired.

"_Liar_," the voice said with obvious amusement.

Loki twitched and curled in on himself further. Perhaps he _did_ want more for himself, but that was understandable considering his life. These past thousand years, in particular, had been particularly unkind to him. Any signs of affection were welcome to a starving man, it was not as though Loki desired Stark in particular. No matter how brilliant he was, or that dark humor of his that had him chuckling during many of his visits, or the way he touched Loki to make sure he was _real_.

A snarl escaped his lips, and Loki dug his nails into the flesh of his arms to distract himself.

He was _not_ interested in him. He simply needed to break the contract, which could have been formed with anyone, it was not as thought the man was _special_.

Yes, the contract. The one that kept him from falling apart even as he sat there in his hovel of an apartment. The damned contract that kept him retuning to Stark over and over again to merely keep himself functioning at a basic level.

He could already feel it wearing off, his body weakening, every movement slower than the last. Ten hours, it had only been ten hours since he last touched the mortal, and already there were signs of scarring across his body. Loki knew his hands were next, as the last time he spent a week away from the mortal, they broke only four days in.

So, no, he was not interested in that worm of a man, he simply needed him, needed to touch him, to absorb his energy to stay alive.

_For now_, he reminded himself. _Only for now._

Loki could almost feel that nasty little voice laughing at him in the back of his mind, and he dug his nails in deeper. He needed to see Stark, and he needed more blood for another attempt to break the bond. Perhaps he should just cut something off from his body. What need a blind man of an hand or an arm?

"_All the better to hold you with_," the voice purred.

"No," Loki snarled.

"_All the better to ease your pain_," it said again.

"Only for that."

"_Lair_," the voice laughed, and Loki left, only to escape his own mind, not because he wanted to _see_ Stark.

* * *

The burgers tasted better going down than they did coming back up, and by the tenth time Tony had thrown up, he was sure all that was left was stomach lining and maybe some of his soul. He had headed back to the kitchen, intending to search for ketchup, when the first wave of nausea hit him, and he just made it to the sink before he vomited. He was then forced to hang on to the counter for the next hour while he rode it out.

"That... sucked" He coughed and cupped a handful of water to drink. "Strike them off my food list. Food poisoning, gotta be."

"I detected no toxins or bacteria as you expelled said food into the sink, sir."

Tony scowled and moved away from the sink. He didn't get far, and before he knew it, he was sitting on the kitchen floor with his back pressed against the cabinets. Everything was shaky, and for a second, Tony thought it was an earthquake before he remembered he wasn't in California and New York wasn't as prone to earthquakes.

"What is it? What's going on? Please tell me this isn't related to the accident and more to do with my recent head trauma."

JARVIS was silent for a long time, or actually, he wasn't, Tony just dozed off for a second there.

"What?" He asked lowly, trying to keep his head from flopping to the side.

"I am reading high levels of radiation in your body," JARVIS repeated, "such a high level in such a small amount of time is unnatural, considering there are no major sources of radiation in the vicinity that you could have been exposed to."

Tony grimaced and there went his head flopping to the side. Weird, he felt like he was, yep, there goes his body too. He hit the floor with an unpleasant thunk and tried to ask how the hell radiation entered his body in his own goddamn penthouse. Only, his throat was kind of closing up, and he felt oddly hot, like sticky hot, maybe desert hot, and why was he thinking about that? That never helped him feel better, deserts, sand—god he actually felt better with the car battery then he does right now.  
_  
__Is this dying? Why am I dying after all that shit? Why now?__Wasn't I supposed to do something more?_

Strong, blissfully cold, hands lifted his head from the floor, and Tony already had a delirious smile across his face when that British voice called out his name with a surprising amount of concern.

"Stark!?" Now he was being lifted from the floor, which made Tony giggle, for some reason. "Stark, what is wrong?"

"Desert... maybe radiation," he mumbled, nuzzling his head into Loki's chest. Something was thrumming inside of him, and it wasn't his arc reactor. In fact, the ache he had been feeling in his chest since he woke up was easing, and the nausea was almost completely gone.

Tony found himself wrapping his arms around Loki like some kind of life line. Only, that didn't seen to be far off, because the more contact he made, the better he felt. He could actually think now, and his brain was not so dull that he didn't make the connection.

"Are you healing me?" He rasped against Loki's chest. He smelled good, sort of like old wood and spices which was weirdly attractive to him. Then again, he was never one for flowery perfumes, which is why he always enjoyed Pepper and her fruity, tropical scents she use to use. Shit, that was not the direction he wanted his thoughts to go in. Back to the important stuff, like why hadn't Loki answered him?

"Loki? Dapper Man? Ba-Ba Black Sheep?"

"Excuse me?" Loki growled, and tried to dump him onto what Tony hoped was the couch. Tony clung on to him with a brilliant display of monkey skills, and refused to let go no matter how the god snarled and pried at him. "Stark, get _off_ of me."

"No, not until you've answered my question."

Loki sighed right into his ear, which sent a pleasant shiver down Tony's spin that he was ignoring, oh yes he _was_.

"I am not healing you," Loki mumbled as he sat down on the couch, Tony still wrapped around him like a sloth on a branch. "As I told you before, I am incapable of much magic, currently."

Tony chewed this over in his mind as he kept his body firmly pressed against the god. He wasn't even sure of he could move away, even if he wanted to. It was as though the magnet in his chest was attracted to gods, or something, because he had this powerful need to touch him. Loki, too, seemed to relax into him, those long arms wrapping around his back to support him better. It was when a head dropped to his shoulders, long hair tickling Tony's neck and resigned sigh in his ear that Tony knew something was seriously wrong.

Both of them were way too calm about this situation, and since when did touching Loki cure sudden and acute radiation poisoning? Also, where the fuck did Tony even _get_ acute radiation poisoning?

"Loki, what's going on? Why are you even here again, why do you keep coming back?"

The body tensed against his, and for a moment Tony thought the god wasn't going to answer him.  
When he did, something about the tone of his voice sounded strangely guilty.

"Stark, there is something I must tell you..."

When he didn't continue, Tony prompted, "_Okaaaay._.. tell me?"

Loki shifted so that his head was away from him, and Tony could almost feel the god's eyes boring into him.

"I may have made a grave mistake that... may be the cause of your current condition."

Tony started to tense up now, and he had to force his body to shift away from Loki. He still didn't get far, but he didn't exactly feel like snuggling right now.

"Which one? I have many, you know."

Loki was silent again, the kind of silence that loomed over you all foreboding and terrifying, and _holy shit something was seriously wrong_.

"Loki, which one?" He asked again, his stomach filling with dread.

A soft brush of fingers grazed his eyelids just as they had once before, and Loki said, "This one."


	6. Meltdown

"What?" He breathed, fingers curling into fists against the god's chest.

"In my escape, I may have caused this."

Tony forgot how to do that thing called breathing. He really _needed_ to do that thing, because his head felt fuzzy and his body was going numb. Air was good, air was fuel for his brain and he really, really needed full control of that right now.

In a display of Bruce-like zen, he managed a few deep breaths before asking, "_You _did this... how did you even...?"

"If I tell you, swear to me you will listen all the way through," Loki urged him. Then he added in a quieter voice, "there are things you must know... and things even I am unsure of."

Loki sounded very much like he didn't want to admit this, which didn't exactly reassure Tony in anyway. What do you do when the super-powerful god didn't know what was going on with magic and you really, really didn't have a clue?

Tony let go of the Loki's shirt and sat up straight, feeling awkward and irritable. What he really wanted to do was book it across the room and maybe fine a suit, some sort of weapon and a drink.

_Yeah, I need a drink._

But no, his body was not having any of that. Apparently, it decided that what it needed as a nice dose of _Loki_, and nothing else. He could not physically leave the god's lap, embarrassingly enough. What the hell was he thinking when did he started clinging to him?Oh, that's right, he wasn't, he was dying of radiation poisoning and Loki magically appeared. Now he was stuck in his lap and he had no idea how he was gong to handle this 'story'. No, that was a lie, he had some idea. Not good, that's exactly how.

"Talk then," he said at last, facing Loki and, even though he couldn't see, looking him right in the eye. He almost smiled when he felt the god's discomfort come off his body in waves. Someone didn't like being faced with their mistake, huh?

"Then, I shall begin with my escape..."

Tony prepared himself to listen in perfect, unnerving silence as Loki began to explain, hoping to put him off, or at least get an ounce of guilt out of him.

"I was locked away immediately after my trail, in a cell made to dampen my powers. My hands were... bound and—"

"You mean they were _crushed_, Thor said they were crushed between metal plates."

Loki's body twitched in what felt like a wince before he went on in a tight voice, "I suppose they were, yes. I am surprised he actually told you of that. As mournful as he appeared for the trial, he was not present for most of my incarceration. Only the king and several servants were there... oh, and the Lady Frigga..."

Tony waited after the awkward pause and started to lose control of his neutral expression. His mom was there? That must have been a little extremely horrible for her to watch.

"Your mom was there, right? Frigga is your mom, I thought. How did she take it?" he prompted.

"She was the one who spelled the plates together, and the thread that sewed my lips closed."

"What?!" Tony gasped. "Your _mother_ did that to you?"

"Don't you _dare_ judge her with an ounce of your petty mortal justice, Anthony Stark, or you shall lose your tongue! Do not presume to understand anything of our lives, " Loki snapped quickly in response, and Tony put his hands up in resignation. He wasn't really one to judge, being a family issues poster boy, himself, and he liked his tongue still attached to his head, thank you very much.

"She is the only one strong enough to contain my magic," Loki explained, still tensed up like a cat ready to spring. "she was the only one who could even begin to contain it, and even then, I had lost the fight in me and did not... respond as I usually would."

"Are you saying you let them do that to you?"

"Will you ever let me continue my story? I was under the illusion that questions were answered over the course of a tale."

"You could have just said 'hold on, i'm getting to that'."

Tony wiggled a little as the once pleasantly chilly fingers jabbed at his side in an almost playful manner which really didn't suit the situation or the mood, or even _Loki_. Then again, Tony had to be grateful it wasn't a knife or some explosion of magic—oh right, Loki had limited magic now. He couldn't suppress the grin, because excuse me, that tickled, and also because maybe, just maybe, the thought that he could actually take the god in a fight right now was pleasing. Not that Loki seemed to want to fight, and that was a confusing issue Tony was not going to linger on too much right now. Too weird, too complicated, too fucked up.

The tension in the body under him seemed to ease a little, maybe because Tony was smiling—_shut up Tony, that's a ridiculous notion, you are supposed to be smart_—and he quickly settled back down to listen in the silence he promised himself he would keep, this time.

"The important thing you must understand is that magic is not a stationary thing, Stark. It moves constantly through space and time, through bodies and minds alike. It never truly ends or dies, but is transferred to something else, ever changing, ever present."

Tony nodded a little, having a thorough understanding of energy transference, especially involving thermodynamics. It was obviously the same thing, or something close enough to apply the same concepts to.

"The point I am making," Loki continued, "is that my magic was never truly lost, simply pulled away from me and into something else."

"Like what, a tin can?"

"Like a body," Loki answered waving a hand at Tony, "no, not yours, do not make such a face. It was a celestial body."

Tony scoffed, "you needed an entire planet to hold your energy? And I thought I had ego problems."

"Which, of the two of us, has a tower with their name on it, looking over the city?"

"_Had_, had a tower with my name on it, you kind of knocked my name off. Also, you know you would have one too, if you could."

"I am much more subtle than that, Stark."

"An entire _planet_," Tony reminded, and grinned when Loki continued on as though he had never interrupted, the jerk.

"I could not access this... planet to gain my powers back, so I was forced to travel another road." With this, Loki paused, clearly hesitant to get to the next part. The part where Tony obviously came in. Oh this was going to be good...

"I made a contract that—"

"You did _not_ make a contract with me," Tony interrupted cooly, "I would remember that much. Probably."

"I don't need your conscious permission to make one, simply some small essence of you."

At the word 'essence', Tony wracked his mind to find the key memory that would tell him when and how the hell Loki got any 'essence' of his before the god threw him out the window.

"Nothing physical," Loki answered as if he heard Tony's thoughts. "Purely a shard of... well, you." Loki paused and added in a thoughtful voice, "or at least, what I thought was purely you."

Tony shifted in his god-seat and said, "what does _that_ mean?"

But instead of answering, Loki asked, "What is this?" and suddenly there were fingers closing around the edges of his reactor. Tony jerked back so fast he felt his neck crack, and nearly ended up meeting the coffee table again, if it wasn't for Loki's long arms curling around his waist tightly.

"Do-don't touch this, _ever_," he managed, his own hand closing over it. He could feel his racing pulse even through the cold metal casing and took a deep, shuddering breath to fight off the impending panic attack. "You hear me? Don't go near it again."

"Telling me not to go near the device is unwise. Surly you know that would pique my curiosity more?"

"Be curious all you want, but do. Not. Touch. It."

_Don't think about Obi. Don't think about Obi. Don't think about... fuck._

Loki leaned back into the couch and let out a long-withering sigh reserved for dealing with noisy kids and deaf old people. Tony had half a mind to smack the asshole right now, and if the god's half-completed explanation of things was leading where he thought it was, Tony could probably get away with it. He owed Loki a good smack, at the very fucking least. Some other time, sometime when he wasn't about to freak out from, he never thought he would say this but, too much information at once and _way_ too much touching.

"It keeps me alive," Tony answered at last, keeping his hand over it just in case that gave Loki any fresh ideas. "Got shrapnel heading for my heart, this keeps it out. It's the _only_ thing that keeps it out."

"And since when did mortals dabble in magic?" Loki asked in his usual drawl. No, not his usual lazy tone, something more like that voice he used when they talked about physics back the hospital. Fascination, that's what it was. Still, magic? Really? Wasn't this guy was supposed to be _clever_?

"_Magic_? It's not magic you moron, it's science. How dare you insult me like that."

If Loki took him seriously, it didn't show in his voice. "It is a powerful substance, that which is in your chest. There is no point in hiding it, some form of alchemy was used, I recognized it instantly when the power flowed into me."

"Alchemy? Okay, maybe I can go half way with you there... I made it, by which I mean I invented the element that powers it as well as the device. So, alchemy, sure, let's go with that." Tony hesitated a moment as his brain caught up, then asked, "what do you mean 'the power flowed into you'? You were like, a billion, billion miles away in some magic-dampened cell with crushed hands and a zipped up mouth."

"The contract."

"Which means you can just sap my energy whenever you want?"

"Essentially, yes," Loki agreed, once more sounding bitter, if not a little defeated. That was an interesting sound to Tony's ears, Loki, defeated. Wasn't that a good thing for the god, an unlimited power source, clean energy?

"I may have... used your body as a conduit for the spell, and it seems that at that exact moment, you were working with something volatile, yes?"

"You _could_ say that," Tony replied tersely. "It blew up in my face, literally."

"Ah..." was the god's only response, and a weird silence filled up the room. Tony didn't like silences, he never did, but now it felt like he was dropped into the void when the fell. He couldn't occupy himself with his eyes, and usually fidgeting with stuff ended with him dropping said thing and losing it god know where because he couldn't damn well _see_ where he dropped it. Yeah, he _hated_ silence.

"I did not know something happened," Loki said in a strange voice that made Tony wonder if the god was actually lying to him about that. But why lie? He obviously knew about it from the start, what else was there to it that made Loki cover it up so sloppily?

"When I left my cell I was made to follow the path here, where I found—"

"Me."

"Yes, you in a house of healing," Loki spoke softly, the fingers still pressed against Tony's back flexing against his skin. "I did not expect to be called to your side like some sort of _servant_, to be forced to come to you and this damned realm again."

Tony kept his face as blank as possible, but internally he had to admit, that kind of hurt. He knew the moment the stranger showed up in his hospital room that they weren't really there for him. He wasn't anyone special enough to visit, not anymore. But when the Brit stuck around and began spending time with him, maybe, just a little bit, Tony started to hope. That had been stupid, obviously, because angry god or random British guy, who would actually _want_ to be there for him?

Clint only visited out of some sense of duty, that was obvious. Maybe a little sick sense of humor, too, if those fucking dates were anything to go by. Natasha, well, was Natasha. She had a multitude of reasons to choose from, checking in for Fury, that duty thing any government worker in any position seemed to have, planning to kill him in his sleep.

Bruce... that was a failure right there. Bruce didn't want to be there for him, either. Tony understood all of their reasons, but he totally sympathized with Bruce more. No one wants to hurt themselves, and possibly others, just to visit the angry, blind, short man in the hospital. Hell, they couldn't even science anymore, that really dropped Tony out of the picture. At least the guy seemed happy enough to make him pancakes when he got home, gold stars for that.

Then there was Pepper Potts and Rogers, who Tony didn't _want_ visiting in the first place.

So really, who did he have but that random stranger who read to him, and actually talked to him without tip-toeing around the blind elephant in the room? Who fed him in an oddly affectionate way that sleazy women had often tried with him before, and had failed miserably. It wasn't like it was all good, things never were. Even before Tony knew who it was, they argued and sometimes the stranger—Loki, would be such a cold asshole with his comments on Tony's condition.

Tony shifted once more and tipped his head down, no longer bothering with the thousand-yard-blind stare. Loki was definitely not going to feel guilty, even if his mistake was blatantly displayed in front of him, and no amount of Tony's distaste was going to grow the god a heart and earn him an apology. Loki had done what he needed to do, and Tony was just collateral damage.

Why did_ that_ sound familiar?

Those words echoed in his mind until, oh yeah, straight from the mouth of one Directory Fury. Day one of being blind. Ground zero.

"Collateral damage, Stark," he said, "You and I both know it comes with the job, and it don't matter much you think you know, sometimes you're wrong." And somewhere beyond all the pain Tony knew he was referring to his bad eye.

"I wasn't w-wrong," Tony had croaked from inside the quarantine room, his eyes freshly bandaged and still bleeding. "I did everything... right."

"Obviously you didn't."

"I _did_."

"You didn't, it's over," Fury said, and Tony wondered why he was the one to make that call before he blacked out.

Back in reality, Tony had really started to lose what little bit of determination he had been cultivating since he returned to the tower, and tried to shrug away the pain of being disposable. He knew he was easily thrown away, like Fury said, like Loki implied. But, seriously, If Loki was really that 'burdened with glorious Tony', why did he keep coming back? If it was so much god damn trouble, why the hell did he read half the Hobbit to him, or hand-feed him fruit? None of that made any sense for someone who unexpectedly got weighed down with some unwanted mortal.

"Okay, so that explains how you used me, ruined my life, and then was forced to show up in said life to feed me blueberries, _apparently_ against your will, I might add," he said, counting off on his fingers. "What that doesn't explain is why you're here now, again, helping me, _again_."

There was a long moment of silence that usually meant the god had left, but no, Loki was still sitting under Tony, and god dammit did he hate silences. "No reason I wish to discuss with you."

"Uh huh, sure, that's not gonna cut it this time. No more enigmatic bullshit, no more games. You've invaded my life for a reason, something more than this contract, because unless said contract tells you you need to kiss me, I think there's something else going on here that you need to let me in on before I keep assuming you actually want to be here. Just tell me what you fucking _want_ from me."

"I want _nothing_ from you!" Loki nearly shrieked, sitting up so abruptly he almost sent Tony flying off his lap. "You mean _nothing_ to me, you pointless creature! You are simply a worn out tool, a cesspit good for only the heat the damned excrement provides!" Loki's tone turned cold and Tony could hear the nasty sneer in his voice, "just look at you, clinging to me because no one else wants to come near the poor, useless—"

_Thud!_

So, Tony was sent toppling off his lap after all, but he really didn't care because landing that punch in felt so damn good and it was totally worth smashing through the glass top of the coffee table. Now he just needed to run away as fast as he could.

* * *

Loki had not seen it coming, so blinded by his own rage he did not even sense the movement on the air. _That_ was why the full weight of the mortal's fist met his face with no resistance, and sent his head snapping back painfully.

The shock of the attack lasted almost a full minute before he jerked himself up, absolutely fuming.

"How _dare_ you strike me?!" He roared, towering over the little man. He lurched forward to grab Stark's shirt, but was hit suddenly in the stomach by a well placed kick. The mortal under him grunted, flung himself backwards and summersaulted his body away from Loki. He didn't get far, however, because even his pitiful head start wasn't enough to save him from Loki's speed.

He plowed into the man, sending him face first into the carpet littered with glass. The startled whimper of pain was delicious, and Loki dug his knees into the man's back with glee.

"Do you think yourself strong for managing one measly hit? Does the man of Iron feel _brave_?" he mocked, leaning his full weight into Stark's back. The man let out a choked scream and started to struggle underneath him.

"JARVIS... JAR... Loki, S-sto... _ssstop_!" Stark's begging was cut off when Loki curled his fingers in his hair and smashed his face down into the floor. The struggling seemed to cease completely at that, and Loki let out a disappointed huff.

"Such heroes are these, those who cannot even defend themselves from their own weaknesses."

Loki watched the still figure for a moment, his rage still yet to cool, and turned away to leave. There was no point in further confrontation, if the mortal was already down. He would return later to attempt to sort things out, when he was less likely to kill the man.

This time he heard it, and turned to block the blow before it landed. He laughed at the bloody face below him, filled with anger and determination as he had seen it in battle once before. His laugh was cut short when three things happened in quick succession.

One, the man twisted under him, his small body moving too fast and too low to the ground for Loki to keep his grip on Stark's arm. Two, one stubby leg lashed out and sent him sprawling back. He was better prepared for this, and raised his hands to catch himself and spring back into action. Only, the man had other ideas, and quite literally threw his tiny body on top of him the second he had an opening, and slammed them both into the glass littering the floor.

Loki hissed in anger, not caring for the spikes of pain now crawling up his spine. His entire back was on fire now, but that meant nothing, everything was meaningless except one thing. Killing that mortal.

The same mortal, who was currently attempting to press his arm against Loki's throat. He glared up at the mans milky, blank eyes, narrowed and angry even as they were sightless. He wanted to laugh, again, at the pitiful display of bravery. Was this really the man who saved Midgard from Loki's army? Truly, how 'heroes' fall, and fall far.

It took no effort to dislodge Stark from him, just a simple blow to the side of his head that sent him flying across the room into the small step up from the carpeted area they had been struggling in. Loki stood, shaking as much of the glass off of his body as he could, and stalked over to the man who lay panting on the floor.

"What, no witty commentary now?" Loki drawled, standing over him and curling his fingers into the man's shirt to pull him up to eye level. He was so small, so light. Really, it was just too tempting to simply toss him out a window again.

But there was something about the way he was staring up at him in silence that made Loki hesitate. Namely, the way he wasn't breathing.

"Do not think you can fool me..." he began, his eyes narrowing as he studied the face before him. Whatever terror Stark had felt before Loki had thrown him from his tower was nothing as strong as the fear in the man's eyes now. So wide and watery, staring up at nothing as his mouth opened and shut. There were a few rattling gasps, but clearly not enough to constitute as breathing, and everything was slowing to a stop.

"I did not understand... what is this?"

The man did not answer, but one hand began to scrabble at Loki's wrist desperately, nails clawing at the soft flesh of his arm.

"Cease this flailing," Loki demanded, letting the mortal go and watching him drop to the floor like a broken doll. It was not an act, apparently. Any sane man would have at lest protected his head from that fall.

So, Loki knelt down and looked him over, weighing his options. He could let him die of... whatever was ailing him, and perhaps be free of the bond. Then again, there was the possibility that Stark was his only connection to his body of magic, and his death could very well be Loki's as well.

Then there were those captivating eyes staring up at him uselessly. Two broken orbs so full of pain and fear and desperation to live that called out to him in the most terrifying of ways. Even now, as the rattling breaths grew more shallow, the man was still clawing at his chest.

His _chest_.

The device that kept him alive.

Loki's hands jumped into action before his brain could question himself any further. The shirt was pulled free to reveal a still-glowing circlet in Stark's chest that was now surrounded by a strange pattern of bruising. Loki frowned at that, his fingers brushing over the strangely-cold glass plate as he tried to assess the situation.

Bruising meant something had punctured his chest in some way, perhaps the object already in his chest? How deep did that thing go, and if it were driven further into his body, were his lungs not... but... _oh_.

Loki remembered his knee driven into the mortal's back, the grinding, crunching sound as he pressed him further into the floor. He _had_ done this to him, and that usually quiet voice in the back of his mind screamed, "_FIX HIM!_"

"How?" He whispered to himself, his hands ghosting over the spreading bruises once more. "I do not even know where to begin, and my magic..."

"_Fix him._"

"I don't know how to fix this," Loki choked, fingers now curling around the rim of the device.

"_HELP HIM!_" It screamed again.

"I CANNOT!" Loki bellowed, and something under the palm of his hand exploded with light.

_Oh_, he thought, _how had I forgotten? The power source and I are connected._

Loki pulled at that power, feeling it twist and writhe its way up his arms and into his core. It was strong, so bright and clean, and nothing at all like his own tainted magic. He knew this was something he would never feel running through his veins so potently again, and wasted a second to bathe in its gentle glow before he pushed it all back into the man under him with a whispered spell on his lips.

Stark screamed, so sharply and loud that Loki winced at the sound. It was only a short moment, and Loki was sad to see the last drop of energy flow from his finger tips, leaving him cold and empty inside. The body below him glowed with a renewed warmth, and the first few breaths were wet and gasping. And only a moment later, the man started to wheeze with laughter.

"Let's never fight again," he rasped, grinning up at the ceiling in a way that made Loki unsure if he was joking or not. Either way, he smiled to himself, glad that the man could not see it, and opened his mouth to agree that, yes, that would be advisable if he wished to remain among the living.

Before he could speak, there was a deep tolling of a bell, and Loki had only a second to look up at the sound before he registered the thudding of hurrying feet coming down the hallway.

Stark was sitting up in the blink of an eye, pushing blindly at Loki's body and gasping, "Loki, you've got to go! Fuck, you need to go, _now_!"

Loki pulled himself up from the floor, casting one last look down at the worried face, and strong arms pushing away, and teleported himself away just as someone's voice called out.

"Tony!?"

His dingy apartment flickered into view, and the sparse, emptiness of it struck him harder than ever. His hands still felt warm from where they had pressed against the mortal's chest to save his life. Just was the man's hands had pushed him away to save him from comrades.

Why had he done that for him, to keep him a secret even after Loki had nearly killed him?

Why did he had to save that infuriating man from death in the first place?

Why did continue to return time and time again, just as Stark had asked him?

Why?

Why?

_Why_?


	7. Fate's a Bitch

It was raining.

It had started hours ago, first with large drops that struck everything with a loud, uneven chattering. Then, the barometric pressure slowly decreased, and the sound became a steady roar as the sky decided to throw itself upon the city.

_Somewhere_, Tony thought, _there was an upset God of Thunder. Or maybe two upset gods, actually._

He was currently sitting on the couch of the common room, two floors down from his ruined living room and nice, inviting bed. He was lucky, maybe, that none of the team had seen Loki as they burst into the room. Half of him still wished they saw the god, half of him was actually really glad they didn't. It sucked, because Tony wasn't usually one for conflicting emotions or anything complicated in the emotion department at all. When he made a choice, he stuck with it until he was faced head-on with piles of his own fucking weapons in the hands of terrorists, for example. The point was, it took a lot to change his stance on anything, and this thing with Loki was not the exception. It wasn't _supposed_ to be an exception.

It was turning out to be an exception.

The fighting, and the kissing, and whole thing where he was suddenly dying of radiation poisoning and then suddenly not when Loki arrived? Yeah, that was weird. Also strange, was that itch under his skin that was slowly growing the longer he sat on the couch and listened to rain. Actually, that it's might have been from the eyes of four people staring at him from around the room. He could almost pinpoint where everyone was from the intensity of their gazes. To test it out, Tony rolled a chocolate covered blueberry on his hand and chucked it as hard as he could at what felt like the direction of Clint's beady eyes.

"Oow—what the fuck?!"

Tony grinned and gave him a thumbs up, now that he knew where he was. "He shoots, he scores!"

"How the hell did you even manage that?" Clint grumbled, and then Tony felt the blueberry bounce off the side of his head, and laughed. His fingers went back to fidgeting with the bag of them that Bruce gave him, dumping a few into his hand and rolling them around again. It was bribery again. Something to get him to leave his penthouse after their desperate attempts that involved a technique called 'screaming at him'. It was just like the pancakes were, a treat to dangle in front of his face. Bruce sure was a devious one, Tony would have to keep his eye on him.

_Ha ha._

"Tony, seriously, how?"

"My moron sense was tingling," Tony replied at last, closing the bag and pushing it the side without eating the bribe. He had _some_ dignity.

"Tony, can we talk about what happened?"

Tony turned towards the voice of America and scowled. No, they could _not_ talk about it. But knowing Steve, they were sure as hell going to try.

"What happened to the table?"

"It broke."

"Tony, there were chunks of glass sticking out of your back and face."

"I broke it with my back and then inspected it closely."

Steve sighed heavily, and Tony could almost see him rubbing at his forehead like he always did when Tony got under his skin before. It used to be alms of charming, the aggravated soldier 'doing his best' routine. But after what happened with SHIELD and Pepper, Tony found little pleasure in even taunting the man. Honestly, he just wanted to be left alone.

"How about this rain, huh?" He offered as a new topic, gesturing at said weather wailing against the glass behind him. "Has anyone talked to Thor lately, because this has 'moping Thunder God' all over it?"

"He came here a little while back and tried to convince me I was in danger of Loki, apparently," Bruce said from somewhere down at the other end of the couch. "I didn't know you knew he was back."

"He came to visit me in the hospital. Kicked up a fuss with the nurses." Tony chuckled at the memory of the nurses complaining after Thor's visit and added, "he needs to stop doing that. From what I've heard from that Darcy chick, this isn't the first time."

"Wait, did you say _Loki_?" Steve interjected. "I thought Loki was... locked up in Asgard."

Tony heard Bruce shift towards the captain and suddenly he was out of the conversation as the scientist began to explain the same thing Thor said to him before. Not that he minded being left out and all, but why was he down here again? Oh yeah, table smashing and Loki fighting. He really needed to come up with an excuse for the bruises and embedded glass. Maybe later, when his brain didn't feel like mush, and we're they still talking about it? Tony tuned in again just in time to hear Bruce finish his story. "...he seems really upset about Loki avoiding him and I didn't have the heart to tell him that I'm more worried about what Loki's going to do to the world than how Loki feels right now."

"Why didn't he talk to me about it while he was here?" Steve asked in an odd voice.

Tony just _had_ to join in again. "Just because you labeled yourself the leader doesn't mean everyone has to report to you, Home of the Free. Last time I checked, he's a prince, and a god, and you're still the test-tube-super-baby."

"Stark, I'm not even going to bother asking why you didn't tell us about it, yourself. Since you apparently knew about Loki's escape weeks ago."

"Good for you, Rogers," Tony snapped. "I'm so glad you're learning your lesson about asking—excuse me, _ordering_ me to do things. Because any rational creature would see that it was Thor's sob story to tell, not mine, and everyone knows I don't answer to you no matter what mystical army position you hold. Oh, I'm sorry, _held_. Were you ever a captain? I forget."

Steve's glare was burning holes in the side of his head, but the room fell silent except for the sound of rain. It was distracting, that constant noise that seemed to come from all around him. He had never noticed it before, back when he was distracted by looking at things, but it really dampened when it rained. Literally and figuratively.

He could hear the rattle of it against the class, the single repetitive drip somewhere close by that was a lot louder than the rest for some reason. He could even hear the trickle of the pipes that moved through the outer walls, draining the water from the roof.

Steve had started talking to Bruce again sometime during Tony's zone out, with both spies joining in to make plans about Loki. He decided to tune them out once and for all, because he really had nothing left to offer them, and besides, Loki was _his_ problem, not theirs. He would deal with it as he saw fit, and currently, he kind of just wanted to curl up in Loki's arms like he did for that short spell the night before. It was funny how almost dying by his hand, again, didn't seem to deter any of his desires to be close to the god.

And there was that itch again, clawing up his chest, scratching at the back of his mind like a cat. He needed to see Loki again, soon. Especially since he had a theory about the acute radiation poisoning that needed to be proven one way or another. Preferably without the actual events of poisoning again, and possibly with less beating-the-shit out of one another. That wasn't fun.

_And you were so fucking wrong about being able to take him in a fight_.

Voices rudely interrupted his rain-zen as they tried to get him to join the conversation as 'Chief Strategist' or whatever bullshit position it was today, and he did his best impersonation of being deaf. They only gave up after he started humming, one of them whispering, "childish," in a low voice they probably thought he couldn't hear. Someone obviously forgot that Tony was, in fact, not deaf, but very blind instead.

After that, he kept his face turned to the window, and silently wished it would rain every day. If only to drown out the bullshit around him and give his sightless life some background.

By the time Tony escaped their clutches, with as little explanation about the events of his table-smashing as possible, hours of ignoring their planning had passed. He was already starting to feel nauseous again, which could either be due to the fact that he hadn't eaten since he threw up and had a throw down with Loki, or maybe it was time to test his theory. Either way, they were starting to get on his last nerve, anyway. His _last_ last nerve.

Thankfully, the team didn't seem all that eager to keep him around anymore, and somehow Tony ended up in the service elevator again without realizing it. He let out half-hearted string of curses when the damn bell sounded at his floor. It was Irritating. _Everything_ was irritating.

"JARVIS, put in a work order for that thing and... maybe order some more food."

"Work request sent," JARVIS replied quickly, "perhaps we shall order from another establishment this time, sir?"

Tony leaned against the wall, not even ten feet from the evil elevator, and checked his pulse. He felt like shit, battered and achy all over and maybe a little dehydrated, too. Not that he could blame the god for that part, the rest of it, however, was all on him.

Whatever Loki had done had apparently healed him, to a point. It seemed to have focused on the major stuff, like the arc reactor being driven into his lungs and esophagus and all that fun stuff, and clearly some pretty deep gauges had disappeared, if he remembered correctly. He was still covered in smaller cuts, probably with some glass permanently embedded in his face somewhere, and his knuckles felt like he had been punching a wall. Which, with Loki's boney face, was pretty accurate.

Another wave of nausea hit him, and he let out a weak groan, glad to be alone when it started to kick him in the stomach. Just a minute longer and he would really have to start explaining things to those nosy jerks. Well, Bruce would probably want to work on him first, but the others might try to send him back to the hospital, or worse, to SHEILD.

"Hmmgh... maybe hold the food, I feel like... I think it's coming back."

"The radiation sickness?"

"Yep," Tony said, as he counted his heart beats. It was speeding up a little, either in panic or with the fever rush he felt coming over him. His knees gave out pretty quickly this time, and he slumped against the wall, gagging on nothing but stomach acid. Why was he allowing this, again? Oh right, testing... testing for...

"Oh... I forgot the second h-half of the... equation."

"Sir, I am calling your team back up here before—"

"No!" Tony yelped weakly, and slid further down to the floor. "Gotta know... no team..."

"What are you waiting for?"

Tony grinned lazily, his mind going hazy as his body threatened to give out at last.

"Loki."

It was raining, and as usual, Loki both adored and hated it. There was something appealing about the dark clouds that hung heavily overhead, lightning striking the tallest buildings across the city. Every rumble of thunder was doubled, tripled; each one echoing off the buildings on and on, forever bouncing off the glass walls of his new prison.

Yes, prison. He city he had sought to destroy was now his home, at least, until he broke his bond with Stark. He hated to admit it, but it burned to see that damned mortal living in all his luxury while Loki himself lived in squaller. Still, it was better than his previous prison, even if the boundaries were just as limiting. Such weak magic surrounding him, only to flair up when he was close to Stark. That damned contract was a foolish idea, and Loki did not often make such poor mistakes.

"_Liar_," the voice purred, and Loki turned it out for the sound of the rain.

He loved it because silence came with the rain. For all the growling in the sky and the patter of the rain against every exposed surface, living things tended to grow quiet when a storm came. They ducked inside to curl up in their hovels and watch the great beast in the skywith an old, primal fear. A fear of the gods that never left their mortal minds even as they progressed from love of the earth to love of meaningless objects. Even now, they still lived in fear of a god's wrath.

Loki sucked in a breath and blew against the glass of the rattling window he was leaned against. From his lips, ice crawled across its surface, tiny fractals forming delicate patterns all the way up to the rotted wooden beam that separated the panes.

What were the gods anymore? What was he, to these mortals that no longer bowed to him from his simple tricks alone? He used to elicit worship by simply stepping upon their soil, a wave of a hand here, a well placed spell that turned their least favorite cousin into a pig. It was easy then, and perhaps that was why it grew boring and pointless in such a short time. That was why the gods left them, and in their time away, humans grew daunted and bored with their own existence, just as Loki had all those years ago.

Now it took much more to make them grovel, now it took an army, death and blood, examples made of those who stood against him. It took his wrath to make them remember he was a god again.

A wrath was flame, and war, and rage, and _work_. Wrath was something Thor was better at, with his lighting and his determination for what's right to be right, and wrong to be wrong. The foolishly strong belief that if one simply _tried_ harder, everything would be good and well again.

But Loki had a different rage inside of him, and nothing ever looked so black and white. But where it did not burn, or spark like Thor's temper, it coiled, twisted, and expanded like ice. Slow and deliberate, with much more finality than any of Thor's temper tantrums could ever come to. It was fluid until the anger slowly built and built and then there was nothing but sharp, cold hatred. That was Loki's wrath, and that was why he hated storms. Because he was different, and the sky was as gray as Loki's world had always been. Because it was Thor in the rain, Thor in the lighting, and Thor's unhappiness was all around him.

Loki lifted a finger and dragged it through the ice on the window pane, the faint heat of his body enough to melt a line through it. He could ignore it, but this time he wouldn't. His hands were already shaking, and there was something akin to a scream building up in the back of his mind. The contract was alerting him of something, and he would not be a fool to ignore it again, even if it meant suffering that man's presence one more.

"_Suffering, yes, I pity you and the sweet kisses you are forced to endure_."

"I have half a mind to dig you out, myself," Loki growled at the voice, standing from his seat and dusting himself off.

"_Then who would be your voice of reason?_" The voice scoffed, creeping back into the dark recesses of his mind to fall silent once again. Loki furrowed his brow, considering, not for the first time, that there may be something wrong with how free spirited his inner voice was. Was he really that split apart over this? Surly he had never had such active arguments before now? Then again, he had never been so conflicted over something. He lived in a gray world, but he did not dither. A choice was made, and perhaps it was good, perhaps it was bad, but it was his choice, and his alone.

Then just who or what was pushing him towards this mortal?

Loki's eyes widened, whispering,"The contract...?"

The voice didn't reply, but somehow, Loki felt it was laughing at him. He scowled, turning on his heel in a flash of gold and appearing before the mortal who crafted this new cage for him without even knowing.

"Hooray..." Tony cheered weakly, managing a small wiggle of his fingers at Loki. The God had poofed into existence with a small pop somewhere near by, and Tony could already feel the nausea ebbing away. By the looks of it, his hypothesis was correct, and that the mere presence of the bastard was enough to stem off whatever this was.

"Stark?" Came the god's voice, not startled, but maybe a bit confused. "Are you ill again?"

Pushing himself off the floor with a pathetic groan, Tony leaned back against the wall. He wasn't going to get far, not like this, and he sure as hell wasn't letting Loki carry him anytime soon. "Yeah, about that... something you want to tell me?"

"I know not what you mean," Loki replied, sounding honestly like he knew not what Tony meant and for fucks sake, wasn't this guy supposed to _know_ this stuff? Magic was Loki's field, not his.

"So you have no idea why I start to suddenly almost up and die of radiation poisoning when you're gone for too long? Or how about the fact that the time between your visits seems to be getting shorter, like we're not doing something thing right and getting punished?"

There was a soft thump of Loki's body hitting the wall next to him, and an exasperated sigh sent chills down Tony's spine as the god's breath tickled his neck. Okay, it was a little infuriating that he felt better, a lot better, the closer Loki got.

"I did not know, or ever suspect that you may be affected as I am. This was supposed to be a very temporary connection, yet somehow I am trapped here with you. "

"Wait, you get sick, too? And since when did you know you had to keep sucking energy out of me? Was that why you kept coming back to the hospital?"

Loki laughed bitterly, and Tony thought the sound was more depressing than anything else. "Yes, Stark, as pitiful as it is, I have need of your tiny mortal body. My suffering part of the contract, however, is another creature entirely," he answered, and leaned against Tony's shoulder suddenly. He grunted, a part of him wanting to push the contract-making bastard away, the other half still wanting to curl up in his arms and go to sleep.

"Hey, I may be short, but I nearly kicked your ass earlier." He fell silent for a minute, his head flopping on to Loki's shoulder. "So something does happen to you when you run away from me, though."

"You did not come even close, Stark, and yes, I seem to revert back into the condition I was in before my escape."

"You revert...?" Tony questioned softly, the rusty gears rattling into life in his mind. "If that's true for you, that means I was actually dying before your stupid spell kicked in."

"What do you mean?"

"I was working on something for SHIELD when you pulled your voodoo shit, and usually I don't work with any kind of nuclear cores or radioactive materials anymore, because come on, there's better ways and I don't _make_ fucking weapons anymore, but that's what they wanted and I was sort of... coerced into giving them what they wanted." He frowned and leaned a little heavier into Loki, adding darkly, "and by coerced, I mean _threatened_."

Loki let out a grunt that sounded wholly unimpressed, but didn't comment further. So, Tony continued, "Actually, maybe Fury was right, maybe I did make a mistake. The sky must be filled with swine, the seas red, hell must be getting pretty chilly, a golden shit must—"

Loki cleared his throat, interrupting Tony's tangent, "Are you implying that my contract with you may be saving your life?"

"Maybe, but it's not like I know anything about magic, like _someone_ here. Isn't it the same for you, weren't your hands crushed?"

"I would hardly die from the conditions I were living in whilst imprisoned, and I would be foolish to craft something that would sabotage myself in the process."

"True, plus you gave me a nice set of useless eyes, so I don't really _see _any upside to this for me. Is this how all magical contracts work, the conduit gets the shit end of the stick while the magic user gets, what, stuck to them? Somehow I have very little sympathy for you right now, and I might have managed to dredge some up when I heard about your hands."

"Do not pity me, ever," Loki warned in his ear, and before Tony could say 'I don't do pity', Loki continued quickly, "This is my first time attempting something like this, so my knowledge is a little limited, while the rest you simply would not understand. All magic works in a way that you must give what you take. I think the shortening of our time apart was the consequence of me healing you. But, you are alive," Loki added softly, "that is always something to be grateful for."

"Says the guy who killed hundreds of people, who I'm pretty sure would have been _grateful_ to have continued living. Dare I remind you of the window incident? Or how about you driving your 300 lbs of god weight into my back and almost killing me, oh, what, was it just this morning?"

Loki shifted away from him, leaving Tony's shoulder feeling cold, and somewhere inside of him empty. "I refuse to argue over this again. I would rather go than—"

"Don't go," Tony interrupted quickly. "Just ignore me, I'm a bitter old man who sort of stuck to a bitter old god for some extended period of time, and we both kind of hate each other, although I don't know why you hate me, i'm loads of fun as you might have noticed back in the hospital. But, then again, i've never been known for being chipper."

"No, I imagine you aren't," Loki mused, not moving close enough for Tony's liking. So, he closed the gap himself, shifting down enough to practically snuggle into Loki's chest. There was a pause that breathed hesitation before those long arms wrapped around him, and both let out an embarrassingly long, content sigh.

Why were things getting more complicated? What happened to the simplicity of mystery hospital visits and fruit baskets? Now it was all, 'we're connected by some shit that makes us sick if we're apart too long', and the unspoken promise of being sucked dry at some point. And not in the kinky way either, more like the unfriendly vampire, who may actually sparkle, but really only wants you for your body. Well, blood. Well, magic energy source. Whatever.

Tony closed his eyes, enjoying the small satisfaction he got from true darkness. There was always this slight gray haze at the edges of his vision that reminded him that he was, oh yes, blind. At least with his eyes closed, he could still pretend that any second now, he would open his eyes and see the pale gray walls, the table thing with that vase Pepper bought, maybe even Loki. He wondered if the god looked the same as the last time he saw him, sunken eyes, all beat up and sulky with his tail between his legs. The thought of seeing him like that now kind of made him sick, considering he now knew what they had sent Loki back to that day. Okay, so maybe it wasn't pity, but he felt _something_ about it, he wasn't that heartless.

_Wait, since when did I get a heart?_

Tony blinked at that thought, opening his eyes to more dark, and frowned to himself. Even in the hallway, tucked in the inner guts of the tower, the rain filled the silence with its never-ending roar. Tony listened to it, thankful to avoid further dissection of his so-called 'heart', and wondered if maybe someone should talk to Thor before they needed to build an Ark.

"Hey," he muttered into the god's chest suddenly.

"Mmh?"

"Why don't you stay here for now, at least until we figure this out. It's easier than popping back and forth whenever one of us needs this... contact... thing."

Those long fingers dug into his arm, and for a second Tony thought he felt the hairs on the back of his neck rise, as if lighting was about to strike him dead right then and there. But they relaxed a second later, running down his arm in a soothing motion. Loki chuckled softly, and once again, something about it made Tony sad. "I suppose I will, then. Only for as long as it necessary. I will amend my mistake before I am forced to suffer your company for too long."

Tony nodded in agreement, mostly to himself because that little nagging voice was saying, "_liar_," again and he really didn't want to think about all the trouble they could get in if anyone found them curled up in the hallway like this. Or saw the way they kissed, or figured out that Tony kind of needed Loki, and not because of some contract.

"Yeah, just for _now_..." he said softly, and hated himself a little for letting Loki be the exception.


End file.
